Guns Finally Silent In Somalia's Capital

"When you are really sick, you'll try any kind of medicine," Ali Hussein Maalin, 56, a Somali businessman, said in an interview in Nairobi. "We have been sick for 15 years."

The courts expanded into Islamic militias strong enough to challenge the city's secular warlords, which had enjoyed the financial backing of the CIA, according to widely circulating reports.

The United States has neither confirmed nor denied these accounts but has acknowledged supporting the warlords as part of an effort to capture terrorists suspected in a string of attacks in East Africa, including the bombings of two U.S. embassies in 1998.

A series of clashes this year between the Islamic militias and the warlords left more than 300 people dead. But the militias have expanded their control to nearly all of southern Somalia.

So far, the militias have not moved into the town of Baidoa, where Somalia's transitional government is based. The government was created by a U.N.-backed conference in Nairobi and has little authority in Somalia.

Leaders of the Islamic militias have said repeatedly that they intend to negotiate with the government so that it can eventually move into Mogadishu and reunite the country. They have also said they will disarm their own forces, turn over any terrorists and not resort to extremist Islam.

"The only thing we would concentrate on is to bring peace and stability to this region," Abdulkadir Ali Omar, the second-in-command of the Islamic militias, told reporters here.

Within Mogadishu, the militias have already largely succeeded in their stated goal, though the toll remains high from the long years of violence.

The sidewalks of the city are a jumble of rusting shacks. Wandering goats graze on heaping piles of garbage. Wide boulevards are cracked and nearly treeless, the best timber having been cleared for firewood years before.

Moderates among supporters of the Islamic militias acknowledge a rising extremism within the country. More women than before cover their faces rather than just their hair. Strict Islamic justice is popular. City leaders warn that without massive and rapid rebuilding, anti-Western forces such as al-Qaeda are certain to expand their appeal.

After midday prayers Friday, several thousand demonstrators gathered in the city center to protest the national government's decision this week to invite foreign peacekeepers to Somalia. The move has been widely condemned here as an opportunity for Ethiopia, Somalia's historic enemy, to meddle in its affairs.

"We don't need foreign troops!" the demonstrators chanted, pumping their fists.

Several placards, handwritten in English, captured the mixture of political feelings coursing through Mogadishu.

"America Open Your Ears And Eyes," read one. Another exhorted, in broken syntax: "Democracy Go To The Hell."

Yet in interviews, Mogadishu residents expressed far more anger at the secular warlords than at the United States. Many said the foreign power they feared most was Ethiopia.

There was also palpable unease about the plans of the Islamic militias, which are by all accounts a fractured group split between moderates and extremists. The militias, the residents said, attempted to shut down a company that dubbed Indian movies in Somali, apparently because they regarded the films as too risque. Others recalled occasional moments of thuggish behavior by militia members.

One youth, Faisal Yacquub Ali, 17, took a break from watching the World Cup match to declare himself "fully against" the Islamic militias because he feared they would eventually turn against movies and soccer matches on television.

Yet Jimcaale, who after 15 years was considering opening another clothing store, was less certain of the future. As the sounds of the soccer match drifted from a nearby cinema into a hotel cafe nearby, he said, "I see now the cinema is still open."