Bartamaha (Nairobi):-Fourteen Somali journalists exiled in Kenya said Thursday they are receiving repeated death threats from the hardline Somali Islamist group, the Shebab.
The journalists spent Wednesday night camped outside the headquarters of the United Nations refugee agency (UNHCR) in Nairobi to publicise their plight.
The threats take the form of phone calls, emails and text messages, some of the journalists said.
Daud Abdi Daud told how a Shebab official threatened him on the phone with the words: “we’re holding the blade that will kill you. We haven’t sharpened it yet because we’re waiting for you”.
Ubah Abdi Nur, another Somali journalist, said she does not feel safe in Nairobi.
“I received calls from a Shebab official. I can’t give his name. I’m still not in safety. I’ve been accused of mixing with people in Nairobi who condemn what the Shebab are doing in Somalia,” she said.
Ibrahim Mohamed Hussein, the former head of Somalia’s television channel Universal said he had received death threats.
“A call coming from Somalia said I wasn’t far away from the Shebab and added ‘You will be severely punished’,” he said.

The hardliners, which have vowed to overthrow the internationally-supported transitional government, control vast swathes of Somalia, where nine journalists were killed in 2009 alone.
“We left Somalia for fear of being killed and it’s unfortunate to see this harassment continuing now that we have found refuge in a neighbouring country,” said another journalist, asking not to be named.
Another said her family had been receiving “worrying” messages and that since they started she moves around to sleep in different places.

On Tuesday, a journalist working for Radio Mogadishu, Sheikh Nur Abkey, was shot dead and his mutilated body dumped in a street in the Somali capital.
Somalia has not had a functioning government for nearly 20 years.

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Source:-AFP

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