Published: January 05, 2009

Western Journalists Freed in Somalia

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Two Western journalists, who were kidnapped on November 26, 2008 on their way to the airport in the port city Bosasso in southern Somalia after finishing a story on piracy of the coast of Somalia, have been feed, Garowe Online reported.

However, there is no word of what has happened to the two local journalists and driver who accompanied Colin Freeman and Jose Cendon.

Somalia is considered the deadliest country in Africa for journalists, according to the press freedom organization Reporters Without Borders (RWB).

In its annual report for 2008, RWB writes that the heavy toll for Somali press includes eight dead, four injured, some 50 journalists in exile and others holed up at home after abandoning their work in fear.
In addition, 53 journalists have been arrested while doing their job in southern Somalia, where the capital Mogadishu is located, in the semi-autonomous Puntland in the north, or in the self-proclaimed state of Somaliland in the north-west.

Somalia has not had a stable government since 1991.

Islamists briefly took over the capital and other areas in the center and south of the country for several months in 2006 before they were ousted by Somali and Ethiopian armed forces in early 2007.

The Islamist rebels have since regrouped and are waging almost daily attacks on Somali forces, Ethiopian troops, peacekeepers, foreign aid workers and local civilians.

Somalia is also suffering from soaring inflation caused by the global food crisis and a plague of counterfeit money planted into Somalia's currency circulation. In addition, droughts and floods have devastated crops in Somalia, which imports more than half of its grain.