Somali Islamists distance themselves from bin Laden

MOGADISHU, July 2 (Reuters) Somalia's powerful Islamist movement today distanced itself from Osama bin Laden's view that deployment of troops to the Horn of Africa country was part of a crusade to crush budding Islamic rule.

''Osama bin Laden is expressing his views like any other international figure. We are not concerned about it,'' said Sheikh Sharif Ahmed, the moderate former leader of the Islamist group told reporters in the capital Mogadishu.

The purported audio recording by bin Laden warned the United States and other countries against sending troops to Somalia where Islamists control Mogadishu and have sought authority across the country.

Bin Laden urged Somalis to back the Islamists and to fight Somalia's interim President Abdullahi Yusuf and his allies, warning that offering any support to Yusuf or international forces would turn Muslims into ''infidels''.

But Ahmed, who led the Islamist militia that captured Mogadishu after ejecting secular, U.S.-backed warlords on June 5, said bin Laden's call was his own personal view and not that of the Islamist movement known as the Council of Islamic Courts of Somalia.

Despite appointing hardline cleric Sheikh Hassan Dahir Aweys -- who the United Nations has linked to al Qaeda -- as its leader, the Islamist movement denies links to terrorism or that it wants to impose Taliban-style rule in Somalia.

Somalia's weak interim government and African nations support the deployment of peacekeepers to the country which descended into lawlessness in 1991 when warlords ousted military dictator Mohamed Siad Barre.

But the Islamists strongly oppose foreign intervention.

FOREIGN INTERFERENCE The Islamists and the government last month agreed to recognise each other and meet again in mid-July in Khartoum.

Ahmed, chairman of the Islamist movement's 15-member executive committee, said Somalia was suffering from too much interference from the international community, which was threatening talks with the government.

''There is extraordinary interference going on in Somalia both militarily and politically,'' he said. ''The international community should stop interfering in order to give a chance to internal negotiations.'' Ahmed repeated the group's claims that neighbour Ethiopia had sent troops inside Somalia, in the Beled-Hawo area of Gedo and Bakool. On Saturday, Somali sources said Addis Ababa had sent troops to Baidoa, the seat of the transitional government to support Yusuf.

Ethiopia denied the claims and accused the Islamists of fabricating the allegations to hoodwink foreign powers.

Ahmed denied reports the Islamist group was receiving funds from Yemen, Saudi Arabia and other Middle East countries.

''We are financing our operations from funds received from supporters in the local community,'' he said.

REUTERS CH RK1802