ICRC: Attacks on aid workers in Somalia are 'incredible'

GENEVA — Attacks on Somalia's government officials, journalists and aid workers have risen to an "incredible" level in the Horn of Africa nation, the International Committee of the Red Cross said Monday.
But Pascal Hundt, the ICRC's outgoing head of delegation for Somalia, said the neutral agency is taking enough precautions to be able to continue providing food, drinking water, medical services and other help to hundreds of thousands of Somalis. more.... http://www.usatoday.com/news/world/2008-06-30-aidworkers-Somalia-attacks_N.htm also Gunmen kill prominent elder in central Somalia. Well-known Traditional elder Yasin Ali Barre aka Fitilig was killed last night in Galkayo [the provincial town of Mudug Region, central Somalia on Monday night residents said.
He was among the well known traditional elders in the region.
He was killed by two men who masked their faces as he came out from a telephone sub station, while some other reports say he was coming from a tea shop.
This is not the first time that people have been killed in Gaalkacyo.
Recently planned assassinations carried out by al shabaab who masked their faces have taken place in the town. Reasons behind the killings remain unknown. The group, also known by its French name Medecins Sans Frontieres or MSF, has withdrawn international staff amid the humanitarian crisis because of violence from an Islamist-led insurgency against the Somali government and its Ethiopian military allies.
Violence against civilians has come from all sides, MSF said in a teleconference with reporters in New York. Internal refugees are crammed into unsanitary shelters while prices for rice and corn have tripled since the start of 2008.
"Every time we think that it can't get much worse, it does. ... We feel we have reached a new low," said Nicolas de Torrente, executive director of MSF in the United States."Aid workers are increasingly targeted in Somalia, kidnapped, killed," he said.