GAROWE, Somalia, September 10, 2015 (Garowe Online)-Puntland Government in northern Somalia has dismissed reports circulated in some news sites as unfounded and fabricated, putting blame on parents, Garowe Online reports.

On Wednesday, relatives of young men stranded off Red Sea coast said on VOA Somali Service that their children were recruited for the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL).

In an interview with BBC Somali Service, Puntland Information Minister Mohamud Hassan So’adde Tuesday noted that Somali youths secretly sailed as illegal migrants to cross the Red Sea into conflict-ridden Yemen.

Moreover, he unveiled that Puntland security forces are on manhunt for the on-the-run smugglers of the unseaworthy boat.

ISIL terror group is known for smuggling people and other migrant trafficking networks to get more robust foothold in impoverished Yemen.

Yemen shares strategic maritime boundary with Somalia’s Puntland.

Meanwhile, So’adde denied that paramilitary units went on strike over unpaid salaries, dismissing media reports ‘baseless’.

On August 24, Garowe Online correspondent spotted new shillings paid to civil servants and security forces.

The country’s highest monetary authority urged Puntland to hold back ,and called the printing ‘illegal and unethical’.

GAROWE ONLINE