’Cuban soldiers captured in Ogaden’

Press, 27 January 1978, Page 5

’Cuban soldiers captured in Ogaden’

NZPA-Reuter Nairobi Somali forces have claimed to have captured several Cuban soldiers fighting with Ethiopian forces in the Ogaden war, but Ethiopian officials have repeated earlier denials that any Cubans are involved.

There was no independent confirmation of the capture of the Cubans Informed sources in the Somali capital of Mogadishu said the national news agency Sonna had been told that the Cubans were being held in the northern Somali I regional capital of Hargeisa. Efforts by reporters to contact officials in Hargeisa to discover more details about the prisoners were frustrated when telephone communications failed. I Somali officials said the ;men were captured in fight- ) ing which flared up near the ; Ethiopian city of Harar, in , the mountains which fringe; the north of the semi-desert Ogaden region. Several other Cubans were reported to have been killed. Ethiopia’s actins Informa-1 tion Minister (Mr Baalu Girma) contacted from Nairobi by telephone, repeated! his Government’s denial that i any Cuban military person-! pel were in Ethiopia. He said there were Cuban doctors helping the stretched, Ethiopian medical services. I They were based “all over, the country” and some may! have been in Harar, he added. ; Radio Mogadishu, moni-i tored in London, has said; that combined Ethiopian,! Soviet, and Cuban forces! launched big attacks on; Sunday but, in the biggest, battles of the war, they) were “utterly defeated” by) Somali forces. i