Having bulldozed themselves in a spectacular cross-border adventure with relative ease in unseating Islamist forces from Mogadishu, Etiopian and Somali loyalist forces have been given a rude awakening as they lost four men in am bush.Gunmen in Mogadishu ambushed an Ethiopian and Somali convoy on Sunday evening by the KM4 Junction at the center of the city.

At least four persons, two of the allied forces and two civilians, were killed, while a dozen more were wounded after a number of unidentified gunmen threw explosives and opened fire indiscriminately at the Ethiopian and Somali government forces. The exchange of gunfire lasted 10 minutes.

Although the Ethiopian troops are not so visible in the streets of Mogadishu, ambush attacks against them have mounted lately.Several times in the past, they were attacked with hand and propelled grenades while passing at south and north of Mogadishu.

Thousands of heavily armed Ethiopian troops backing the transitional government forces seized the capital on 24 December last year when Islamists fled the capital.

Analysts say the insurgency, which is slowly beginning in the capital may be linked to the video message from the second al-Qaeda leader, who recently urged Muslim extremists in the world and the Somali people themselves to attack and kill the Ethiopian troops in Somalia and prevent Western interests in the Horn of Africa.

The United States has promised $16 million of aid to Somalia, while it has stationed marines at the somali port in apparent support for the UN-backed government and the Ethiopian miliatry presence..

Somalia has been without a central government since 1991 when warlords toppled former president Siad Barre.

(Culled from the Cape Argus [of Cape Town] of January 7, 2007)