Mogadishu central prison reopens

Mogadishu's main prison was reopened on Saturday, and immediately became the home for 50 prisoners awaiting trial. It was last used in 1995, when UN forces left Somalia. Humanitarian sources told IRIN that 27 more prisoners arrived on Monday.

Over the last two years, the Islamic courts have provided the only detention service in many parts of southern Somalia. Sheikh Hasan Sheikh Muhammad, the chairman of Mogadishu Islamic courts, told IRIN that the Islamic courts were "winding down operations". He said the Islamic courts were now basically operating as police holding cells. "We can only hold those we arrest for 24 hours and then we have to pass them and their charge sheets on to the prosecutor to file charges in normal courts", he said. Sheikh Hasan said the Islamic courts - which operated as a critical security force in Mogadishu before the election of the Transitional National Government last year - had turned over their heavy weapons to the Government. He confirmed that the Islamic courts were still running the prisons outside Mogadishu, in the absence of a government presence.