
                         Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: MONDAY, September 27, 1993                   TAG: 9309270035
SECTION: NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL                    PAGE: A-6   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: From Associated Press and Los Angeles Times
DATELINE: NEW YORK                                LENGTH: Medium

QUIET DAY IN MOGADISHU

U.N. forces skirmished with Somali gunmen in Mogadishu on Sunday, but there were no casualties, officials said. The clashes came a day after three U.S. soldiers died when their helicopter was downed by a rocket-propelled grenade.

The soldiers were remembered with songs and prayers at a U.S. military chapel service Sunday in Mogadishu, U.S. officials said.

"It's been a particularly quiet day," Capt. Tim McDavitt, a U.N. spokesman, said in a statement.

McDavitt said a mortar round landed in the U.N. compound Saturday night but did not explode. The round was detonated Sunday morning, he said.

Also Saturday night, two Somalis fired AK-47s from a rooftop, McDavitt said. U.N. guards from Tunisia returned fire, but there were no casualties, he said.

The U.N. compound is a regular target of fire from the forces of warlord Mohamed Farrah Aidid, blamed for killing more than 50 U.N. soldiers and wounding hundreds since the United Nations took over the Somalia operation from the United States in May.

On Saturday, a U.S. Blackhawk helicopter was struck by a grenade as it circled an area held by Aidid's fighters. The pilot and co-pilot crash-landed the plane and escaped to safety, but three crewmen were killed in the explosion and fire.

The dead were identified Sunday as Sgt. Ferdinan C. Richardson, 27, of Watertown, N.Y.; Sgt. Eugene Williams, 26, of Chicago; and Pfc. Matthew K. Anderson, 21, of Lucas, Iowa. Richardson was based at Fort Drum, N.Y., while the other two were based at Fort Campbell, Ky.

The pilot, Dale Shrader of Giles County, Va., was being treated in Frankfurt, Germany, for a broken wrist and second- and third- degree burns to his arms, face and back.

In Washington, Senate Armed Services Committee Chairman Sam Nunn on Sunday criticized the U.N. manhunt for Somali warlord Mohammed Farah Aidid and said that Congress should take action to compel the Clinton administration to "narrow the mission" of U.S. forces in Mogadishu.

Interviewed on NBC's "Meet the Press," the Georgia Democrat said that a "fundamental mistake" was made in Somalia when the aims of the U.N. peacekeeping mission were broadened as the number of U.S. troops taking part was reduced.

Of the roughly 25,000 U.S. troops sent to famine-stricken Somalia in December to restore order and distribute food, only about 5,000 remain; the rest were replaced by troops from Pakistan, Morocco, Nigeria and 24 other countries.

by CNB