"We shall do what we can to safeguard aid workers especially in the areas under our control," Sheikh Hassan Dahir Aweys, new leader of the Alliance for the Re-Liberation of Somalia (ARS), told Reuters.

"We shall help, escort and defend them."

Aweys, who replaced moderate Sheikh Sharif Ahmed as head of the Eritrea-based opposition alliance, called for a halt to the killing and abduction of aid workers.

"We are very grateful to the aid workers who are helping the starving Somali community and we strongly condemn those who kill or abduct them."

He pledged to protect aid workers saying his fighters are often blamed for the wrongdoing of others.

"They are killed by the enemies who put the blame on us," said the former prison service colonel.

A total of 19 aid workers have been killed in Somalia this year while 13 others have been abducted, according to the United Nations.

Many aid groups have already scaled down their operations in parts of Somalia.

The UN World Food Program (WFP) warns that violence in Somalia threatens to wreck all efforts to resolve a humanitarian emergency that could soon rival the country's famine in the early 1990s when hundreds of thousands died.

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