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AP Wire | 02/20/2007 | Hopes for peace fading in Somalia

AP Wire | 02/20/2007 | Hopes for peace fading in Somalia: "MOGADISHU, Somalia - Somalis fled their violent capital by the hundreds on Tuesday, in cars and on foot, pulling carts heaped with belongings in a desperate attempt to leave an onslaught of mortar and rocket attacks behind them.
Government forces and Ethiopian troops exchanged heavy fire overnight with insurgents, leaving 15 dead and 45 injured in the heaviest fighting this year in Mogadishu. Among those killed were a 4-year-old boy and a pregnant woman. A 12-year-old girl lost both her legs, doctors said.
'We cannot keep our children in this violent situation,' said Yonis Nor, who left the capital with his eight children and hundreds of other families. 'I am scared.'
Mogadishu's escalating violence threatens to plunge Somalia back into the years of anarchy and chaos that dogged the nation after 1991, when warlords overthrew dictator Mohamed Siad Barre, igniting a 16-year conflict.
Numerous attempts at restoring order have failed. The transitional government was formed in 2004 with U.N. help but - with no real army or police force - has had little authority."

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