On January 13, 2007, the Somali transitional parliament voted to authorize the government to declare martial law. The authorization and the accompanying declaration of a state of emergency followed Prime Minister Ali Mohamed Ghedi's call for the parliament to declare three months of martial law in hopes of reestablishing order following the capture of Somali capital Mogadishu from militias seeking to establish Islamic law. Ethiopian and Somali government forces had been fighting since December against the Islamic Courts Union, a fundamentalist movement, which has largely dispersed from urban areas. Somalia has been without a functioning central government since 1991.


Somali coat of arms

Learn more about Somalia from the JURIST news archive.

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