UN hails release of staff member abducted recently in Mogadishu

The United Nations today welcomed the release in Somalia of one of its national project staff members, who was freed during a fracas after being detained for nine days.

Mohamed Farah Omar, who had been abducted on 27 August in the Somali capital of Mogadishu while working for the UN Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO), was set free this morning when factional fighting broke out in north Mogadishu near the building where he was being held. After his captors fled, Mr. Omar was freed along with five other Somalis who had been kidnapped and held in the same location.

Mr. Omar was taken for safekeeping to the UN compound, examined by a UN medical officer and then returned to his family. He was the fourth UN staffer abducted in Mogadishu this year.

"This appalling wave of criminal abductions is not just affecting UN staff," said Maxwell Gaylard, the UN's designated security official in Somalia. "There are reports that many more ordinary Somalis have also been kidnapped, including children."

Calling on community leaders, religious figures, politicians, faction leaders and the people of Mogadishu to work together to stop the pattern of abductions, Mr. Gaylard noted that these crimes hamper UN humanitarian operations aimed at helping Somalia.

Meanwhile, the Office of the UN Humanitarian Coordinator today confirmed that Somalia’s Gedo region has been temporarily closed to all UN air operations and international staff because of insecurity.

In another development, a UN expert on Somalia today wrapped up an 11-day mission to the country by calling on local leaders, civil society organizations, and the international community to work together to address serious human rights problems throughout the country.

During visits to a number of areas in the country, Ghanim Alnajjar looked into a variety of pressing human rights concerns, including the state of the judicial system, law enforcement and prison conditions, the challenges of demobilization and child soldiers, economic and social rights, the status of women, human rights education, and difficulties faced by internally displaced persons (IDPs).

Security concerns prevented Mr. Alnajjar’s three-person team from travelling to the capital Mogadishu or the southwestern town of Baidoa. He voiced concern about the escalating violence there, which “is having an impact on the human rights of thousands of ordinary people.”