Gone Forever - Old Somalia

The last democratic elections in Somalia was back in 1969 just before a bloodless coup imposed military rule after the assassination of President Abdirashid Ali Shermarke .....

President Abdirashid Ali Shermarke

Its last vaguely effective national government ended in the early 1990's, and it is now fractured in to many differently controlled regions (and even the breakaway state of Somaliland, which is probably the best governed part of the old Somalia, and the semi-independent Puntland which is run by militias).

Apologists For Silence

We in the West live in a civilisation, in which women are declared as equal to men, in which we are free to not bend to any religious dogma, where freedom of expression is or should be an absolute imperative, where freedom of thought should be be non-negotiable, and the freedom to speak out against tyranny or threats is a baseline.

 

Sheikh Harith al-Nadhari - 'Limit To Free Speech'

So while no one is suggesting that everything Charlie Hebdo drew, or wrote was funny (especially outside of France, where most French humour falls flat) ... but defending their freedom to say, draw and write what they wanted, is fundamental to what we are, or rather were, until we were asked by many to change our way of life, to accommodate one new group migrating into our civilisation .... but now "the danger within" (as one German security source has described them), is likely to force us to either react, or submit (accommodation is simply not an option).