Somalia Says to Eliminate al Shabaab in Months

Residents gather outside the Pearl Beach Restaurant following an attack by Al Shabaab militants at the Liido beach in Mogadishu, Somalia June 10, 2023. REUTERS/Feisal Omar/File Photo Acquire Licensing Rights
Residents gather outside the Pearl Beach Restaurant following an attack by Al Shabaab militants at the Liido beach in Mogadishu, Somalia June 10, 2023. REUTERS/Feisal Omar/File Photo Acquire Licensing Rights
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Somalia Says to Eliminate al Shabaab in Months

Residents gather outside the Pearl Beach Restaurant following an attack by Al Shabaab militants at the Liido beach in Mogadishu, Somalia June 10, 2023. REUTERS/Feisal Omar/File Photo Acquire Licensing Rights
Residents gather outside the Pearl Beach Restaurant following an attack by Al Shabaab militants at the Liido beach in Mogadishu, Somalia June 10, 2023. REUTERS/Feisal Omar/File Photo Acquire Licensing Rights

Somali President Hassan Sheikh Mohamud said a military offensive against al Shabaab aims to eliminate the al Qaeda-linked group in the next five months, but security experts question the timeline amid persistent militant attacks.

Mohamud plans to officially launch the second phase of the campaign in coming days from the central town of Dhusamareb, where thousands of troops are gathering before being deployed to the frontlines.

The first phase began in August last year, with the military rallying behind clan-based militias in central Somalia.

That rare collaboration helped produce the most significant territorial gains against the militants since the mid-2010s, but al Shabaab has continued to stage deadly attacks against military and civilian targets, AFP reported.

The second phase is meant to push into southern Somalia, the traditional stronghold of al Shabaab, which has been waging a brutal insurgency against the government since 2006.

"We want to eliminate al Shabaab from the country in the coming five months," Mohamud said at a town hall meeting in Dhusamareb on Thursday evening.

"If we do not clear them out completely, then maybe there will be few pockets with a few harmless al Shabaab that cannot cause problems."

Security analysts are sceptical of vows to eradicate the group, saying it has deep roots in communities across the country, while government forces have limited experience and capacity.

The militants have moved back into some rural areas that government forces captured during the first phase and have inflicted heavy losses on their enemies.

They killed at least 54 Ugandan peacekeepers in a raid in May, and at least 30 Somali soldiers in July in a suicide attack on a military academy in the capital Mogadishu.



Huge Power Outage Paralyzes Parts of Spain and Portugal

This photograph shows a flamenco dress factory without light and workers during a massive power cut affecting the entire Iberian peninsula and the south of France, in Seville on April 28, 2025. (AFP)
This photograph shows a flamenco dress factory without light and workers during a massive power cut affecting the entire Iberian peninsula and the south of France, in Seville on April 28, 2025. (AFP)
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Huge Power Outage Paralyzes Parts of Spain and Portugal

This photograph shows a flamenco dress factory without light and workers during a massive power cut affecting the entire Iberian peninsula and the south of France, in Seville on April 28, 2025. (AFP)
This photograph shows a flamenco dress factory without light and workers during a massive power cut affecting the entire Iberian peninsula and the south of France, in Seville on April 28, 2025. (AFP)

A huge power outage hit large parts of Spain and Portugal on Monday, paralyzing traffic, grounding flights, trapping people in elevators and leaving power operators scrambling to restore power to millions of homes and businesses.

Some hospitals halted routine work and the two countries' governments convened emergency cabinet meetings, with officials initially saying a possible cyber-attack could not be ruled out. Outages on such a scale are extremely rare in Europe, and the cause could not immediately be established.

Reuters witnesses said power had started returning to the Basque country and Barcelona areas of Spain in the early afternoon, a few hours after the outage began. It was not clear when power might be more widely restored.

Hospitals in Madrid and Cataluna in Spain suspended all routine medical work but were still attending to critical patients, using backup generators. Several Spanish oil refineries were shut down and retail businesses shut.

The Bank of Spain said electronic banking was functioning "adequately" on backup systems, though residents also reported ATM screens had gone blank.

"I'm in a data center, and everything has gone off. All the alarms popped up, and now we're with the groups, waiting to find out what happened," said Barcelona resident and engineer Jose Maria Espejo, 40.

In a video posted on X, Madrid Mayor Jose Luis Martinez-Almeida urged city residents to minimize their journeys and stay where they were, adding: "It is essential that the emergency services can circulate."

In Portugal, water supplier EPAL said water supplies could also be disrupted, and queues formed at stores by people rushing to purchase emergency supplies like gaslights, generators and batteries.

The main Portuguese electricity utility, EDP, said it had told customers it had no forecast for when the energy supply would be "normalized", Publico newspaper said. It warned it could take several hours.

Parts of France also suffered a brief outage. RTE, the French grid operator, said it had moved to supplement power to some parts of northern Spain after the outage hit.

Play at the Madrid Open tennis tournament was suspended, forcing 15th seed Grigor Dimitrov and British opponent Jacob Fearnley off the court as scoreboards went dark and overhead cameras lost power.

TRAFFIC JAMS

Spanish radio stations said part of the Madrid underground was being evacuated. There were traffic jams in Madrid city center as traffic lights stopped working, Cader Ser Radio station reported.

Hundreds of people stood outside office buildings on Madrid’s streets and there was a heavy police presence around key buildings, directing traffic as well as driving along central atriums with lights, according to a Reuters witness.

One of four tower buildings in Madrid that houses the British Embassy had been evacuated, the witness added.

Local radio reported people trapped in stalled metro cars and elevators.

Portuguese police said traffic lights were affected across the country, the metro was closed in Lisbon and Porto, and trains were not running.

Lisbon's subway transport operator Metropolitano de Lisboa said the subway was at a standstill with people still inside the trains, according to Publico newspaper.

A source at Portugal's TAP Air said Lisbon airport was running on back-up generators, while AENA, which manages 46 airports in Spain, reported flight delays around the country.

Such widespread outages are unusual in Europe. In 2003 a problem with a hydroelectric power line between Italy and Switzerland caused a major outage across the whole Italian peninsula for around 12 hours.

In 2006 an overloaded power network in Germany caused electricity cuts across parts of the country and in France, Italy, Spain, Austria, Belgium, Netherlands and as far as Morocco.