54 UGANDAN SOLDIERS KILLED BY AL-SHABAB IN SOMALIA, SAYS UGANDA’S PRESIDENT MUSEVENI

Colleagues pay their last respects to the deceased. Ugandans constitute the largest contingent in the African Union force in Somalia. Photo by @PsychoSomalia (FILE PHOTO)

Sun 04 June 2023:

54 Ugandan soldiers were killed in an al-Shabab attack on a base holding African Union peacekeepers in Somalia, according to Yoweri Museveni, president of Uganda.

Museveni made his remarks on Saturday, a week after al-Shabab fighters assaulted the base in Bulamarer, 130 kilometers (80 miles) southwest of the Somali capital of Mogadishu.

The armed group claimed it carried out suicide bomb attacks on May 26 and killed 137 soldiers.

Museveni said on Saturday that the Uganda People’s Defence Forces (UPDF) had since recaptured the base from the al-Qaeda-linked armed group.

“Our soldiers demonstrated remarkable resilience and reorganised themselves, resulting in the recapture of the base by Tuesday,” the president said.

Museveni said last week that there had been Ugandan casualties but had not given further details about the attack on the troops, who are serving in the African Union Transition Mission in Somalia (ATMIS).

Since 2006, Al-Shabab has fought to replace Somalia’s Western-backed government with its own rule based on a strict interpretation of Islamic law.

Following President Hassan Sheikh Mohamud’s election victory last August, the government launched an intensive attack that has achieved substantial achievements in eroding the group’s authority over wide swaths of Somali land.

However, al-Shabab remains capable of carrying out massive strikes on government, commercial, and military targets.

It also undertakes assaults in neighboring Kenya on a regular basis in retaliation for Nairobi sending troops to support Mogadishu’s rebel pushback.

SOURCE: INDEPENDENT PRESS AND NEWS AGENCIES

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