MOGADISHU, March 7, 2019 (BSS/AFP) – Four people were killed and nine
wounded when a car bomb exploded near a restaurant in central Mogadishu on
Thursday, police said, as the Al-Shabaab jihadist group claimed
responsibility.
The blast “was caused by a car loaded with explosives, we perceive that it
was parked near a restaurant along the road,” Somali police official Ibrahim
Mohamed told AFP.
The restaurant was near a security checkpoint in the Somali capital, not
far from the presidential palace. The road in which the blast occurred houses
eateries and tea shops.
“The explosion was very heavy, and we could see the smoke and dust
overwhelmed the whole area, it was a car bomb,” said witness Ibrahim Farey.
Another, Aisha Hassan, said several vehicles were destroyed and buildings
damaged.
Al-Shabaab said it had planted the bomb, claiming in a statement that its
“fighters targeted one of the checkpoints of the palace apostates.”
The nationalist, Islamist group, linked to Al-Qaeda, is fighting an armed
insurrection in Somalia against what it sees as heretic and foreign
influence.
Earlier this month, at least 20 people died in an attack in Mogadishu
which saw Al-Shabaab jihadists battling security forces for nearly 24 hours.
The Shabaab were chased out of Mogadishu in 2011 by the 22,000-strong
African Union mission AMISOM, and have had to abandon most of their
strongholds.
But they still control vast rural areas and remain the key threat to peace
in Somalia.
President Mohamed Abdullahi Mohamed, elected in February 2017, has
declared a state of war against the group.