Mogadishu, Nov. 14, 2007 (FIDES/CWNews.com) - "The people can take no more," the apostolic administrator of Mogadishu, Somalia, has told the Fides news service.

“Dramatic news continues to arrive from Mogadishu. Fighting persists and the people cannot take any more. This is a rebellion to every effect,” said Bishop Giorgio Bertin of Bishop of Djibouti, the apostolic administrator of Somalia's capital city, where transition government troops backed by Ethiopian soldiers have been fighting anti-government militia for several days.

The people are leaving the city en masse, according to UN officials; some 24,000 have already left the capital. Mogadishu is without water, food, medicine, or electricity. The people in flight have no assistance and they sleep on the edge of the roads along which they are moving to find shelter and safety.

“I am in contact with the Caritas dispensary at Baidoa, which assists the local people and those arriving from Mogadishu. The latter speak of fighting in which most of the victims are civilians,” Bishop Bertin told Fides, adding that the number of homeless has doubled in a few months. “In Somalia there were 400,000 displaced person, but since March the another 400,000 have been displaced, bringing the total number to 800,000.”

Bishop Bertin says “at moment it is difficult to see a solution" to the political chaos that has enveloped Somalia. "After 15 peace conferences, the last one in Mogadishu in August, Somalia's political leaders have still not reached an agreement for a stable and lasting peace," he notes.

Somalia has been without an effective national government since 1991. After many months of sputtering negotiations, rival warlords reached an agreement in 2004 to create a transitional national government, but that body has been unable to impose order on the country. Islamic forces have challenged the authority of the interim government, while neighboring countries continue to back rival claims.

Bishop Bertin observed, in his talk with Fides: “The different crises in west Africa have at least two elements in common: on the one hand spreading extremism which exploits religion irresponsibly for its own political ends, and on the other various foreign powers fighting for control of local resources.”

In his latest recent report on Somalia, UN secretary general Ban Ki-moon, said at the moment, the conditions that would allow for the deployment of a UN peacekeeping force in Somalia do not exist.