MOGADISHU (AFP) — At least eight people were killed in the Somali capital on Wednesday in fighting that erupted after Ethiopia Woyanne-backed government troops raided a suspected rebel hideout, residents said.
Government troops and insurgents clashed using machine-gun fire and rocket-propelled grenades in northern Mogadishu near a military camp, they said.
“I saw four civilians and two Somali soldiers who were killed by mortar shells,” said Hassan Abdullahi Abdulle, a resident.
The Somali army said it killed two insurgents while three of its men were wounded in the clashes.
“Two insurgents who were killed in the fighting were carried by their colleagues for burial after fighting stopped,” Somali army spokesman Dahir Mohamed Hirsi told AFP.
Residents said stray shells wounded at least 13 civilians — many of them children — in Huriwa, one of the most volatile districts in the seaside capital.
Several residents confirmed the clashes that came after days of calm in a city that is contested between the UN-backed government and Islamists accused of links to Al-Qaeda.
In Addis Ababa, the Ethiopian Woyanne defence ministry said at least 15 insurgents died.
“Fifteen Shebab (Islamist) insurgents were killed by the transitional government troops this afternoon in defensive measures taken after an attack on their military barracks in Mogadishu,” it said in a statement.
“Scores of others were injured while a number of weapons were captured during the attack,” it added, but the veracity of the statement could not be confirmed.
In Nairobi, Kenyan President Mwai Kibaki pleaded with the world to help Somalia end nearly two decades of suffering that has been worsened by chronic food shortage.
“Indeed, the recent developments in that country will require a new impetus in bringing all the parties in the conflict to a process of dialogue that will guarantee the people of Somalia peace and security that they so much desire,” Kibaki said in a statement.
Kenya chaired a regional peace panel that helped reach a peace accord that brought Somali President Abdullahi Yusuf Ahmed to power in 1994, but the aging ex-warlord has failed to restore stability in his nation.