Freelance militias disarmed in Kismayo

The Juba Valley Alliance (JVA), which controls the port town of Kismayo, southern Somalia, has launched a security operation aimed at clearing guns from the town's streets.

"The operation has a dual purpose," JVA spokesman Abdirahman Haji Waldirah told IRIN on Tuesday. "To encamp all the JVA militias and then identify and arrest the freelance gunmen who have been the major cause of insecurity in the town."

"We have put all JVA forces in four camps to keep them out of the town. Anyone carrying a gun outside of these camps will be treated as a criminal," he said.

"So far we have removed 1,374 guns from the streets and arrested over 47 suspects on various charges," he added.

The operation which was launched last month "went into top gear in the last week or so", a local humanitarian source told IRIN.

"I hope they sustain it. Kismayo has been experiencing an increase in insecurity in the last few months. Since the start of this operation there has been a marked improvement in the security situation of the town."

Abdilatif Hashi, a Kismayo businessman, told IRIN that the townspeople welcomed the JVA's action, but added that the operation must be sustained.

"They have undertaken similar operations in the past which later fizzled out," he noted. "They must keep up the pressure and not allow the gangs to return."

Waldirah told IRIN there was "no turning back". "This will continue until Kismayo is safe," he stressed.

He added that the Alliance had, for the first time since it captured the town in 1999, started collecting taxes. "If people want security and other services they have to pay for it, and paying taxes is the way," he stressed.

He said the JVA would expand its anti-crime operation to remove militia checkpoints "which litter the Kismayo-Mogadishu road". The 500 km road had become very dangerous of late, with increased banditry and extortion of travellers by militiamen manning the checkpoints, he said.