The US-led campaign aimed at fighting groups it regards as terrorist organisations could cause Somalia to return to violent anarchy, the United Nations has warned.
Experts say the ravaged country is at such a delicate point in its political history that it would not take much to cause serious trouble.
"I am concerned that any external or internal factors that might threaten Somalia's fragile stability . . . or disrupt trading patterns and economic life because of, for example, closed roads, or people being forced to flee, will lead to a severe humanitarian crisis," United Nations Humanitarian Coordinator Mr Randolph Kent said.
He said he had no specific information on US plans but the United States has indicated Somalia may be harbouring people or groups it regards as terrorists.
The UN has publicly criticised the US for closing Barakaat, a company used by more than a million Somalis abroad who used it to send money to relatives back home. The US claims the company was funding international terrorism.
"Somalia's fragile economy has been further weakened by the closure of money transfer agencies through which the all-important remittances are channelled," read the forward to the 2001 edition of the UN's Human Development Report on Somalia.
According to UN estimates, $250 dollars will enter Somalia through the remittance system this year, compared to $700 million before Barakaat's closure. "The frightening prospect now is that drought, Rift Valley fever, hyperinflation together with the constraints on the remittance system will put the people of Somalia and the trickle of economic progress on the brink," Mr Kent.
US officials have said Somalia is home to people or organisations linked to al-Qaeda and that members of the group held responsible for the September 11th attacks on New York and Washington might try to seek refuge in Somalia.
AFP