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No link available Stratfor, privately owned strategic analysis service February 2, 2009 Summary Sheikh Sharif Ahmed was elected president of Somalia on Jan. 31. Sharif will be supported by regional and international interests as a moderate Islamist politician, but he still faces opposition from hard-line Islamists — meaning the conflict in Somalia is far from over. Analysis Sheikh Sharif Ahmed, a moderate Islamist, was elected president of Somalia on Jan. 31 in a vote by the country's transitional parliament. He succeeds Abdullahi Yusuf, who resigned as Somalia's president Dec. 29 amid strong criticism for failing to incorporate moderate Islamist elements into the government. As president, Sharif will be expected to represent these moderate Islamist interests; he does not, however, have the support of radical elements who have been fighting the Somalian government and its backers in Ethiopia and the African Union (AU). Sharif will be supported by regional and international interests hoping to isolate hard-line Islamists in Somalia, but opposition from Somalian radicals — including the militant group al Shabab — means the conflict in Somalia has not fundamentally changed. Previously, Sharif was the leader of the political wing of the Supreme Islamic Courts Council (SICC), which briefly controlled southern and central Somalia during the second half of 2006. After Ethiopia's invasion of Somalia in December 2006, Sharif fled to the savannah of southern Somalia, where he was captured; he was then taken to Kenya, where his interrogators included U.S. Embassy officials Sharif was subsequently released into exile in Eritrea (though he has also traveled to Yemen and has been in touch with the Saudi government), where he became a leader of the Alliance for the Re-Liberation of Somalia (ARS). He has not returned to Mogadishu since fleeing after the Ethiopian invasion. Sharif, in exile since January 2007, is taking over a de facto government-in-exile. His supporters are also parliamentarians in exile — the vote in which they elected him was taken in neighboring Djibouti. They have not convened parliament in Somalia, and it is not clear whether they will be able to, as the parliament building is occupied by hard-line Islamist al Shabab fighters, who are opponents of Sharif. Neighboring countries, including Ethiopia, will support Sharif politically in order to try to reduce Somalia's political tensions and the resulting conflict. This support is a departure from the recent past, in which the Somalian government and foreign interests, driven by the United States and Ethiopia, were aligned against the Islamists. These players are now backing moderates such as Sharif against Islamist hard-liners, however, in an attempt to end the Somalian insurgency. U.S. support of Sharif will be aimed at isolating radical Islamists in order to prevent Somalia from becoming a safe haven for international jihadists. (As in Afghanistan, Washington will support religious nationalists as long as they do not collaborate with transnational jihadists.) For its part, Ethiopia will be driven by its national security imperative of preventing Islamist hard-liners from collaborating with ethnic Somali rebels inside Ethiopia to threaten Ethiopia's territorial integrity. As Sharif takes office, two of the issues that had motivated the Islamists' fight against the government are now off the table. The first of these was the presence of Ethiopian troops in Somalia, where they were viewed as occupiers; Ethiopia began pulling back its troops on Jan. 13. The other issue was the failure of the Yusuf government to accommodate moderate Islamist elements — which of course is negated by Sharif's election. Sharif's break with the hard-line Islamists could signal, however, that Islamism in Somalia is on the wane. But Sharif's support inside Somalia is limited. He has no political base in Somalia's northern regions of Puntland and Somaliland, and consequently will have zero influence over the piracy that has been rife off the Somalian coast. Furthermore, as a moderate Islamist politician who has spent the last two years in exile, Sharif has not had control over the direction of the SICC, nor its militant wing, al Shabab. Al Shabab has already voiced its opposition to Sharif, calling him a secularist proxy of U.S. and Ethiopian interests, and has called on its members to fight against the new government. The new Sharif government will be defended by the 3,000 AU troops deployed in Somalia, and by the moderate Islamist militant group Ahlu Sunna Waljamaca, which has been fighting al Shabab for control of central Somalia. But opposition to Sharif will be violent and swift. Regional and foreign interests will support Sharif in order to try to isolate radical Islamists from gaining control over the country. But the Sharif government will be fought just the same by Islamist insurgents intent on defending their gains against a government in exile.