Thursday, May 18, 2006
AFP
Nairobi – Britain on Wednesday formally asked Somalia’s largely powerless transitional government for help in tracing a Somali national suspected of murdering a UK policewoman last year.
International development secretary Hilary Benn said that he had made the request to Somali President Abdullahi Yusuf Ahmed during a brief unannounced visit to Baidoa, where the transitional government was temporarily based.
Benn said he was looking for Yusuf’s assistance in tracking down Mustaf Jamma, a Somali national who apparently fled Britain for his native land after being implicated in the November murder of constable Sharon Beshenivsky.
Govt wracked by infighting
He said: “I asked President Yusuf for every co-operation possible to assist us in trying to locate this individual so that he can be returned to the United Kingdom to be questioned in connection with this crime.
“I got an assurance from President Yusuf that he would do all he could.”
It was not immediately clear what Yusuf could do in response to the appeal, as his government had been wracked by infighting and unable to assert control much of Somalia that had been in throes of anarchy for 15 years.
Jamma, 25, was one of six suspects in the November 18 2005 shooting death of Beshenivsky, 38, who was killed during an armed robbery in Bradford.
The case had fuelled widespread public anger at authorities in Britain, where the government was accused of freeing more than 1 000 convicted foreign criminals without considering them for deportation.
Jamma had not been convicted of the murder but had reportedly served jail term for robbery before being released and escaped deportation at an immigration hearing, just months before the Beshenivsky’s slaying.
Source: AFP, May 18, 2006
