Terror Attacks Continue to Traumatize Somalis

08 February 2010

The city's once congested roads are empty of people and cars. As many as 1.7 million residents have fled nearly daily fighting in Mogadishu since early 2007.

In recent years, the rise of the militant al-Shabab group in Somalia, an al-Qaida ally fighting to implement its ultraconservative version of Islam in the Horn of Africa, has been accompanied by suicide and roadside bombings that have horrified Somalis, even those long accustomed to violence.

In the Somali capita of Mogadishu, the threat of terrorism has not only altered the city's landscape in some areas, it has changed how the few Somalis still remaining in Mogadishu think and behave.

Just a few years ago, streets in the capital were so congested at times, drivers used to have to bully their way forward - car horns blaring - through heaving crowds of people, vehicles, and animals.

As battered and crumbling as much of Mogadishu was after nearly 20 years of constant war, at least the city's two-million inhabitants gave the capital a sense of lively and cheerful chaos.

These days, drivers no longer have to worry about hitting pedestrians or animals on busy streets. The roads are virtually empty. Drivers now honk their horns to alert others that an armored vehicle, belonging to African Union peacekeepers, is approaching them. The honking prompts drivers and pedestrians to quickly move away from the rumbling vehicle to avoid becoming victims of a possible roadside bomb.