October 31, 2004

Over the weekend, heavy fighting in northern Somalia, between gunmen from breakaway Puntland and Somaliland, left over a hundred dead. Abdullahi Yusuf, the newly elected president of Somalia, had earlier been elected head of Puntland. Somaliland sees this as a pretext to an invasion of their territory, and that led to the fighting. Somaliland and Puntland have had hostile relations for some time now. Somaliland said that forces from Puntland invaded.