Ethiopian troops 'enter Somalia'

Somalia says that hundreds of heavily armed troops from Ethiopia have crossed the border and entered Somalia's southern Bakol region.

Somali deputy defence minister Mohamud Mohamed Heyd told AFP that about 300 Ethiopian troops had crossed the border on Thursday night and Friday morning.

He said that the troops were supported by armoured personnel carriers and artillery.

The deputy minister said troops of the Somali transitional government were being sent to the area.

A BBC correspondent in Mogadishu says there is no independent confirmation of the border crossing. There has been no word from Ethiopia itself.

Insecurity

Somalia has made claims in the past that Ethiopia is infringing on its territory.

The Somali government has said that its neighbour is actively trying to destabilise the country and is trying to establish a breakaway state in the south-west.

President Abdulkassim Salat Hassan is struggling to impose his authority on the country

The Somali government was elected at a reconciliation conference in Djibouti last August and is the country's first central administration since 1991.

The government under President Abdulkassim Salat Hassan, however, has failed to take control of much of the country beyond pockets of the capital, Mogadishu.

The rest of Somalia is divided into areas either seeing themselves as independent countries or as fiefdoms of warlords.

In January, Somalia took its claims to the United Nations.

Ethiopia responded by saying that Somalia was using Ethiopia as a scapegoat for its own problems.

Ethiopia argues that, given its long border with Somalia, the country has legitimate national security concerns when the political situation is so volatile.