Deadly car bombing, murder of nun spark condemnation by UN’s Somalia envoy

The senior United Nations envoy to Somalia has condemned today’s assassination attempt on the life of Somali President Abdullahi Yusuf, which failed but resulted in death or injury to scores of people, and yesterday’s murder of a Catholic nun working in the troubled Horn of Africa country.

In a message on behalf of the UN and the European Union (EU), the Secretary-General’s Special Representative Francois Lonsény Fall said he was relieved that President Yusuf and other leaders had survived the car bombing. But he voiced sadness at the loss of life and injuries to bystanders.

The car bombing took place near the parliament in Baidoa, where Somalia’s transitional Government is based. Media reports say at least 11 people were killed in the attack and many more were injured.

In a separate statement issued today, Mr. Fall denounced yesterday’s murder of Sister Leonella Sgorbati, a Catholic nun working in Mogadishu, the capital, which is in the region controlled by the Union of the Islamic Courts.

Mr. Fall called on the Supreme Council of the Islamic Courts to bring those responsible Sister Sgorbati’s death to justice.

“The taking of innocent civilian lives is unacceptable,” he said. “Sister Leonella Sgorbati had worked in east Africa for about 38 years and had been training nurses at a kindergarten hospital in Somalia since 2002. She contributed much to the needs of the population, especially children in the Somali capital.”

Earlier this month, peace talks resumed in Khartoum between Somalia’s Transitional Federal Institutions and the Union of the Islamic Courts. Somalia has not had a functioning national government since the regime of then president Muhammad Siad Barre was toppled in 1991.