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Somalia's government claimed to have full control of territory wrested from Islamists with Ethiopia's military help, as two Ethiopian soldiers were killed in an ambush in the country's southern region.
In Kenya, President Mwai Kibaki urged his Somali counterpart Abdullahi Yusuf Ahmed to resume peace talks with the Islamists, who still pose a security threat despite defeat, in order to achieve stability.
As militia fighters took no notice of orders to turn in their weapons in the capital, an Islamist attacked an Ethiopian camp in southern Somalia town of Jilib, killing two Ethiopian soldiers and another one wounded.
Local officials and residents said said the gunman emerged from a jungle and opened fire at an Ethiopian camp in Jilib, about 100 kilometres (60 miles) north of the key southern port town of Kismayo, which the Islamists lost on Monday.
“The first insurgency attack has been carried out,” said Mohamoud Dahir Farah, the chairman of the local authority.
In Addis Ababa, Ethiopian Prime Minister Meles Zenawi appealed to the world to fund his military intervention in Somalia, pledging to withdraw his troops within weeks.
“We don't have the money to take the burden individually. The international community should provide funding,” Meles told parliament, adding that the cost of the campaign had been “huge”.
Somalia's Information Minister Ali Jama told AFP that his government now controlled the southern port town of Kismayo, the Islamists' last stronghold, ending a dramatic military campaign that was spearheaded by Ethiopian tanks, warplanes and infantry units.
Officials said the Islamists were holed up in Ras Kamboni, a dense forest on the border with Kenya, where authorities boosted aerial and ground patrols to ensure they do not sneak over.
Prime Minister Ali Mohamed Gedi said Kenya had arrested at least 11 Islamist fighters. Kenya said only eight had been detained.
Officials said around 4,000 Somali refugees were stranded on the Somali side of the border after Kenyan authorities refused them entry on security grounds.
Kenyan officials said four Ethiopian helicopters pursuing the Islamists missed their target and bombed a Kenyan border post, prompting Kenyan fighter planes to rush to the area.
A top Kenyan police official, who requested to remain unnamed, told AFP that the helicopters targeted the Somali town of Dhobley, about three kilometres (two miles) from the frontier line, only to end up dropping bombs on Kenya's Har Har border post.
There was no immediate mention of the casualties and damage on the grounds hit.
The Islamists, who are accused of links to Al-Qaeda, have conceded defeat after nearly two weeks of clashes, but vowed to wage a guerrilla war against rival troops.
Somalia disintegrated into lawlessness after the 1991 ouster of dictator Mohamed Siad Barre. It was carved up among clan warlords, some of whom now back the government.
Gedi had vowed to relocate his government from Baidoa, a regional outpost in south central Somalia, to the capital, where Tuesday saw the failed start of a three-day voluntary disarmament drive.
Residents laughed off the notion of Mogadishu's rival militias turning in weapons and an AFP journalist visited one arms collection point but found only officials, who vowed to enforce the ban later on, as Gedi had warned.
“My gun is my profession, I have nothing else to do,” Mohamed Emir Abdi, 22, a local militia fighter, told AFP. “Anybody who needs the gun in my hand should give me money. Otherwise any attempt to get it by force will be disastrous.”
Some residents welcomed disarmament in theory, but said it was unrealistic in a city with shifting alliances, a high level of mistrust and many sub-clans.
“It will be good if all weapons are collected from all local militia and it brings hope,” said Hajimao Bimi, 72. “But I am afraid it will not be possible because Somalis do not trust each other.”
Meles of Ethiopia urged Somali leaders to prevent any return of faction warlords, accused of transforming Somalia into one of the most dangerous nations in the world.
Mogadishu residents were annoyed to see soldiers from a country with which Somalia has fought two territorial wars, but also bristled with anger last week when Somali warlords Mohamed Qanyare Afrah and Abdi Nure Siad returned to their former Mogadishu turfs.
Faced with the intricate nature of the conflict, Kenya's Kibaki has announced plans to convene an urgent regional summit to discuss ways of restoring stability in the country divided among clans and sub-clans.
In talks to Yusuf, Kibaki “appealed to the parties involved to put aside their differences and embrace dialogue as a way of restoring peace and stability in the war-torn country,” his office said.
The Somali talks collapsed early in November weeks before fighting started.
