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(单词翻译:双击或拖选)
Dozens of ethnic1-Somali youths in northeastern Kenya, have returned home amid a parliamentary inquiry2 into allegations they were recruited by the Kenyan military and taken to a military training camp under false pretenses3. As our correspondent reports from the northeastern town of Garissa, there is concern that anger over the recruitment efforts could end up radicalizing some ethnic-Somali youth in Kenya.
Alisha Ryu | Garissa, Kenya 30 November 2009
Dozens of ethnic-Somali youths in northeastern Kenya, have returned home amid a parliamentary inquiry into allegations they were recruited by the Kenyan military and taken to a military training camp under false pretenses. As our correspondent reports from the northeastern town of Garissa, there is concern that anger over the recruitment efforts could end up radicalizing some ethnic-Somali youth in Kenya.
Two months ago, 24-year-old Garissa resident Siad Dhaqane signed up for a three-month training course that he believed would lead to a well-paying job as a Kenyan border guard.
Dhaqane says that is what the recruiters told him when he went to inquire about the job. He and about 150 others signed up that day. Several hours later, they were on military trucks, heading south toward Manyani, a training center for the Kenya Wildlife Service outside the port city of Mombasa.
For hundreds of young men in Garissa, including Dhaqane, the training opportunity was nothing less than a way out of the vicious cycle of unemployment and poverty that have long defined a young man's life in the pastoral, desert community.
On the way to Manyani, Dhaqane says he dreamed about how he would spend the $600 the recruiters said the border guard job would pay every month.
Dhaqane says he was overjoyed by the job offer and was looking forward to the training. But after arriving in Manyani, he and the others were told that they were not going to be trained as border guards, but as soldiers to fight Islamist insurgents5 in Somalia. Dhaqane said the recruits were then warned that anyone who tried to leave Manyani would be thrown into jail.
Mohamed Abdullahi Sirat also signed up two months ago with a recruiter, who told him the United Nations was looking to hire workers for a monthly salary of $600.
Sirat says he was sent to Manyani, where he, too, discovered he was being trained to fight in Somalia. He says he and 90 other men recruited with him from Garissa were told they were to identify themselves as Somalis, not Kenyans.
Since the collapse6 of Somalia's last functioning government in 1991, Kenya has feared the civil war there would create instability in ethnic Somali regions of the country. For the past several years, the rise of an al-Qaida-linked militant7 group called al-Shabab in southern Somalia has only deepened worries about security.
In early October, reports began surfacing that the Kenyan government was recruiting ethnic-Somali Kenyans and Somalis in refugee camps to fight for the U.N.-backed transitional government in Mogadishu. New York-based Human Rights Watch said its investigations8 in Garissa and Dadaab refugee camps found recruiters for the Kenyan government were using deceptive9 practices and false promises to lure10 young men.
Since then, the Kenyan military has repeatedly denied it is carrying out a recruitment drive on behalf of the Somali government. Officials in Somalia have acknowledged a recruitment drive in Kenya for its armed forces, but they say it is only targeting Somalis living in Kenya.
It is not clear how many young men in Garissa have been recruited since October. Local media reports have put the number at around 300.
Two weeks ago, several parliament members visited Garissa, Dadaab and Manyani to investigate the recruitment allegations. Soon after their visit, dozens of recruits from Garissa, including Dhaqane, say they were suddenly ordered to return to their homes.
Dhaqane says his name was called from a list. He says each person on the list was told that if he went home, he would be given a job in Garissa or elsewhere in Kenya and a cash reimbursement11 for the days he spent in Manyani. Dhaqane, who has been back in Garissa for a week, says he has not received anything yet.
In one Garissa neighborhood, some residents are still waiting to hear from their loved ones.
Medina Moge last spoke12 to her brother, Ahmed Moge Omar, three months ago. She says he called her from Manyani camp, telling her he was being trained to fight militants13 in Somalia.
Moge says he begged her for some money so that he could escape from the camp. She sent him the money. But she had heard from other people that he had been caught and beaten.
Moge says she and other residents with missing relatives have tried to contact Kenyan authorities, but have received no help or support. She says there is growing suspicion that Kenya's recruitment drive is being backed by a more powerful country, such as the United States.
She says some people believe the United States is funding this activity because it is a staunch supporter of the Somali government.
Horn of Africa analyst14 for the International Crisis Group, Rashid Abdi, says he is concerned that even if the recruiting stops, rumors15 the West played a part in it may linger on.
"This is a suspicion which many have voiced," said Rashid Abdi. "This is a misperception. But again, it is amazing how much traction16 it has with increasingly alienated17, young generation, who basically believe that there is an anti-Islamic conspiracy18 at work."
Abdi warns the Kenyan government must quickly address the rising sense of betrayal and anger in ethnic-Somali communities or risk aiding radical4 Islamists in their own efforts to recruit Kenya's poor, disaffected19 youth.
1 ethnic | |
adj.人种的,种族的,异教徒的 | |
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2 inquiry | |
n.打听,询问,调查,查问 | |
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3 pretenses | |
n.借口(pretense的复数形式) | |
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4 radical | |
n.激进份子,原子团,根号;adj.根本的,激进的,彻底的 | |
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5 insurgents | |
n.起义,暴动,造反( insurgent的名词复数 ) | |
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6 collapse | |
vi.累倒;昏倒;倒塌;塌陷 | |
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7 militant | |
adj.激进的,好斗的;n.激进分子,斗士 | |
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8 investigations | |
(正式的)调查( investigation的名词复数 ); 侦查; 科学研究; 学术研究 | |
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9 deceptive | |
adj.骗人的,造成假象的,靠不住的 | |
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10 lure | |
n.吸引人的东西,诱惑物;vt.引诱,吸引 | |
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11 reimbursement | |
n.偿还,退还 | |
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12 spoke | |
n.(车轮的)辐条;轮辐;破坏某人的计划;阻挠某人的行动 v.讲,谈(speak的过去式);说;演说;从某种观点来说 | |
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13 militants | |
激进分子,好斗分子( militant的名词复数 ) | |
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14 analyst | |
n.分析家,化验员;心理分析学家 | |
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15 rumors | |
n.传闻( rumor的名词复数 );[古]名誉;咕哝;[古]喧嚷v.传闻( rumor的第三人称单数 );[古]名誉;咕哝;[古]喧嚷 | |
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16 traction | |
n.牵引;附着摩擦力 | |
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17 alienated | |
adj.感到孤独的,不合群的v.使疏远( alienate的过去式和过去分词 );使不友好;转让;让渡(财产等) | |
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18 conspiracy | |
n.阴谋,密谋,共谋 | |
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19 disaffected | |
adj.(政治上)不满的,叛离的 | |
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