Now we'll get reaction to the events we've been hearing about from the Somalis here in Minnesota. Minnesota is home to the largest population of Somali immigrants in the U.S. The state demographer estimates at least 25,000 Somalis live in the state. Most of them live in Minneapolis and are keeping careful track of the Ethiopian military's advance into Somalia and the ensuing violence. This morning, I went to a coffee shop in the Cedar-Riverside neighborhood of Minneapolis. I asked the Somalis I met there how they're keeping track of events in their homeland. I also got their opinions on the news.
Transcripts
text | pdf |
ABDUL GHANI WARSAME: My name is Abdul Ghani Warsame. I'm from Richfield, Minnesota. I live in the United States for 12 years. I'm Somali-American now.
SPEAKER 1: How are you keeping in touch with events going on in Somalia this week?
ABDUL GHANI WARSAME: First of all, I get back from Somalia recently, September 4th. And I have been there for 12 months. And I'm very familiar with governance in Somalia.
JAMAL: Yeah. My name is Jamal. I live in Hopkins.
SPEAKER 1: How are you keeping in touch with events going on in Somalia?
JAMAL: My family will call me and I call them regularly.
SPEAKER 1: What do you hear from them? How are they?
JAMAL: My family lives in Mogadishu. And what I'm hearing is that things are getting bad because what we hear, that the Islamists give the weapons back to the people. And that's what they say. And it's not going to solve anything.
SPEAKER 2: Actually, I will listen to the radio, the television, and we see what's going on there, and newspapers. And we follow from step to step because we have, to be honest, homesickness. And we need to see a good situation in Somali. Therefore, a lot of people, they would like to see where they're born.
For example, me, I didn't see in like 16 years Somalia. And I miss my neighbors. I miss my-- where I born. I miss my-- a lot of things. So we need to become the neighbors between the way it was before the Civil War.
NAGES SOWA: My name is Nages Sowa. I'm from Oromo, Oromia. That is ethnic part of Ethiopia.
SPEAKER 1: In light of events this past week and Ethiopia's bombing of the airports and the support of the transitional government in Somalia, what are you hearing here when you're down here at the coffee shop? What's the conversation been like?
NAGES SOWA: It's a really mixed one. It's actually sad that this is happening because nobody supports this war. From my opinion, point of view, I wish it is politically solved in a diplomatic way. But most of the time, force doesn't solve political solutions, especially in a nation like Somalia because this is a country that had been ravaged with war for years.
ABDUL GHANI WARSAME: Actually, Ethiopia is a friend of Somalia. In the past, Somalia fought with Ethiopia twice. And there was what I can describe like the military regimes both in Somalia and Ethiopia. But now, there is new blood. There is new governments. Things are changing day after day.
Somalis flee to Ethiopia when the Somali Civil War started, and they welcomed us. They opened their arms. They had opened their doors. And about 250,000 Somalis are now in Ethiopia, and they live like we live here in Minnesota. So things are changing. And I'm very optimistic that the friendship between Somalia and Ethiopia will be better. I can say 80% of Somalis are enjoying now what's going on in Somalia.