At least three people were killed and two wounded on Tuesday January 16 in a suicide attack near the offices of the mayor of the Somali capital Mogadishu, according to police and witnesses.
The assailant, who was also killed, detonated a bomb outside a restaurant, police said in a statement. “Among the victims were three dead and two wounded,” it added. Witnesses said they saw the suicide bomber fleeing from the police just before the explosion.
A vehicle parked nearby caught fire after the blast, said witness Mohamud Halane. “People are shocked,” he said, adding that bodies were lying on the ground. The attack was not immediately claimed.
Mogadishu is a regular target of attacks by the jihadist Shebab group, which has been fighting the internationally-backed Somali federal government for over 16 years. These al-Qaeda-linked rebels controlled the capital until 2011, when they were driven out by African Union troops. But the Shebab are still present in vast rural areas of central and southern Somalia.
President Hassan Sheikh Mohamoud’s government launched a major offensive against the Islamists in August 2022, but despite initial successes, operations carried out with the help of local militias have not prevented continued attacks on military and civilian targets. Last week, Somali military sources said they were looking for passengers from a UN helicopter “captured” by the Shebab after the aircraft was forced to make an emergency landing in central Somalia.
According to an internal UN memo to its staff in Somalia, nine people were on board the helicopter, and six may have been taken hostage. One passenger was killed, and two others are believed to be at large, according to the memo. The helicopter belonged to a private Ukrainian company, according to officials in Kiev.