The United Nations Security Council passed a resolution on Wednesday to extend the African Union Mission to Somalia (AMISOM) mandate for six months, a decision South Africa said it would accept only “reluctantly.” “They don't care about Somalia,” said South African Ambassador Dumisani Kumalo, speaking to the press prior to Security Council consultations on Somalia. He expressed his frustrations at the United Nations' delay in sending a peacekeeping force in the region. The United Nations has declined to deploy peacekeepers to Somalia since 1991, with the exception of two brief missions. The country has been persistently plagued by violence between opposition groups and the government. Opposition groups have pledged to continue fighting until Ethiopian troops - who entered the country to rout Islamist rebels - withdraw. Currently, the United Nations recognizes the Somali Transitional Federal Parliament, the UN spokesperson's office told the Saudi Press Agency on Wednesday. But that body is considered weak, and was not even able to convene in the capital Mogadishu when it was first formed.
