(Adds quotes, background) By Andrew Cawthorne NAIROBI, Dec 13 (Reuters) - Somali Islamist forces backed by 4,000 foreign fighters are moving into position for an attack on the interim government's base, Somalia's prime minister said on Wednesday. "I don't think that they are ready for dialogue, for peace and stability to prevail in Somalia. In that case, war may become inevitable," Prime Minister Ali Mohamed Gedi told Reuters after flying into Kenya from Baidoa on Tuesday night. Gedi said the Islamists, who on Tuesday vowed attacks within a week unless Ethiopian forces backing the government left Somalia, were trying to surround Baidoa, the only town the administration controls. The Islamists took Mogadishu and a swathe of south Somalia in June, denting the Western-backed government's aspirations to restore central rule to Somalia for the first time since 1991. Islamist soldiers were in the Buur Hakaba and Dinsoor areas, to the east and south of Baidoa respectively, Gedi said. They had pulled back from Tiyeglow to the north after finding significant numbers of government troops there. "All these movements are an indication that they will try to attack the seat of the government in Baidoa and the surrounding areas. Also, they are planning to surround the temporary seat of the government," said Gedi. Gedi denied Islamist accusations the government had more than 30,000 Ethiopian troops dug in around Baidoa to protect it. Addis Ababa had sent only several hundred advisers to support President Abdullahi Yusuf's administration, he said. The government's own forces, trained in Baidoa and another town, Jowhar, over the last six months, were ready for battle. "I believe there are enough to challenge those who oppose the government," he said, without giving numbers. "They are on alert to defend the government and the people of Somalia from the hostile aggressions and invasion of well-known terrorists in close collaboration and alliance with the so-called Islamic Courts." Gedi said the Islamists had several thousand of their own fighters in south Somalia, backed by 4,000 foreign militants. Of those, about half were from Eritrea while others came from Afghanistan, Pakistan and Chechnya among other places. "We are in a crucial situation ... It is in between peace and war, or in between life and death," he said.
