Associated Press
MOGADISHU, Somalia — Somali authorities have detained nine foreigners, while investigators tried to determine Saturday if the detainees have any links to Osama bin Laden’s terror network.
Speculation has been rife that Somalia could be the next target of U.S. military action in the war on terrorism, since U.S. officials have linked a Somali Muslim group, Al-Itihaad al-Islamyia, to al-Qaida.
Mogadishu police chief Abdi Hassan Awaleh Qeybdid said it was too early to say if the men were terrorists.
"But serious investigation continues on their cases, which is the reason why they are here," said Qeybdid, a member of the anti-terrorist task force that rounded up the seven Iraqis, an Iraqi Kurd and a Palestinian earlier this past week.
A reporter saw the nine men, who appeared to be 25 to 40 years old, at the Central Intelligence Department, but was not allowed to speak to them.
All the detainees have been in Mogadishu, the Somali capital, for at least three months, and several for nearly a year. Although they applied for refugee status with the Somali Red Crescent Society when they arrived, they had been running a cafe called Salahu-Din near the main Bakara market that served Arab food and was popular with businessmen.
The Iraqis had told people they were stowaways on vessels illegally exporting Iraqi oil to countries in the Persian Gulf, and when they debarked in the United Arab Emirates, they were given the choice of being sent back to Iraq or being deported to Somalia.
On Friday, State Department spokesman Richard Boucher said the United States has encouraged "all governments and all governing authorities around the world to take steps against terrorism, to make sure that terrorists can’t operate in the areas that they control."
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