Mogadishu,(insidesomalia.org)-I was interviewed earlier this week about a 13-year-old girl who had been stoned to death in Kismayo, Somalia. Her ‘crime’ was to have been raped and for that she was convicted of adultery. It was a horrible story which brought the daily violence taking place in Somali into sharp focus. Although this kind of execution is thankfully uncommon, it’s an example of the appalling rights abuses that are allowed to persist in the region, unchecked.

Somalia is a country where no basic national justice framework exists; where an ever-intensifying war is destabilising every region, and where thousands of people area being brutally killed in the process.

Nearly nine million people are struggling to survive in a country, which is being ripped apart by the downward spiral of violence, while the rest of the world dismisses it as a ‘failed state’ and quickly moves on to other matters.

Meanwhile, the threat of attack, abduction and death is very real for millions of Somalis. In recent months the country’s Transitional Federal Government (or TFG), backed by Ethiopian troops, has lost control of increasingly large areas of southern and central Somalia.  And in their place, armed opposition groups – notably al-Shabab – have taken over strategic and economically important towns such as the port of Kismayo.

Violence has been commonplace in Somalia for some time. But more recently, the list of victims has been swollen by those – Somalis and foreigners alike – trying to alleviate the suffering of civilians. Dozens of aid workers and human rights activists have been caught in the crossfire.  This year alone, at least 40 humanitarian and human rights workers have lost their lives.

Just last month, two UN staff were killed in a bomb blast at a UN compound in Hargeisa, northern Somalia. And a women’s rights activist was shot dead by gunmen in Guriel last month.

In August, Amnesty learned that Abdulkadir Yusuf Kariye, director of an orphanage in Afgooye – a town just 30 kilometres from Mogadishu – was shot six times by unidentified gunmen in his own home.

Kariye had been running the orphanage since 1991 and had organised protests against the ongoing attacks on humanitarian workers.  Directly after his death, new death threats were issued against other aid workers, warning against any further protests.

Armed militia are attempting to instil a climate of fear in aid workers, peace activists and human rights defenders in the country. They are eager to control the actions of aid workers and to prevent them from carrying out any duties that may contravene their ideology.  Some women’s organisations have been accused of teaching women ‘false rights’ or teaching them to ‘leave the house’.

Some armed opposition groups have considered aid workers to be spies for the TFG or the Ethiopian military, and so have attacked them. To reduce any further such attacks, donor governments and the UN should increase efforts to ensure a transparent and clearly demarcated distinction between apolitical emergency humanitarian relief, and any political or development activities assisting the TFG or the peace process.

Attacks against humanitarian and human rights workers are particularly concerning because -  as we point out in a new Amnesty report published earlier this week - it’s not just the activists and aid workers who are affected. The impact of these attacks is far-reaching. Nearly one in two people in Somalia are expected to have to depend on food aid by the end of the year. But violence and instability has led many organisations to suspend programmes and withdraw staff from the region, putting over three million Somalis, who require emergency humanitarian assistance, at risk.

The international community has to act rapidly to remedy this problem, and they can do so by making Somalia a top priority.

Consistent and high-level global pressure must be applied to the TFG, armed opposition groups and the government of Ethiopia to stop the killing of these workers and the widespread abuses affecting everyone in Somalia.

Practical measures can be taken to quell the instability: the UN arms embargo must be strengthened to stop weapons reaching the perpetrators of human rights abuses; equally an international Commission of Inquiry ought to be established to investigate violations of international human rights and humanitarian law committed in Somalia over the past two years.

Any peacekeeping mission in Somalia should ensure that it has a strong human rights component with the capacity to monitor, investigate and publicly report human rights violations.

And Somalia’s Transitional Federal Government, together with the Ethiopian government, must also take responsibility for the protection of Somali citizens. They can start by ensuring that no human rights violations are carried out by TFG or Ethiopian forces.   And they should remove all roadblocks and other restrictions affecting the delivery of aid to ensure that it reaches the people who most need it.

If these attacks against aid workers and rights defenders are allowed to continue, the impact on the general population could be ruinous. Somalia is already beset with an intense conflict and instability.  Should aid workers and rights defenders be forced to suspend their activities completely, the impact on the people depending on them could be catastrophic.

There is no more time for the UN to waste on this. Closer scrutiny of the conflict and decisive action is required. Immediately.

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