[ad_1]
The armed group Al-Shabaab claimed to have launched an attack on the convoy entering the presidential palace.
On Saturday, Al-Qaeda’s Al-Shabaab organization claimed that a suicide car bomb exploded at a security checkpoint near the Presidential Palace in the capital of Somalia, killing at least eight people.
The checkpoint is located on the route to the airport in Mogadishu, the capital used by the President and Prime Minister of Somalia.
Police spokesman Abdi Fatah Yaden Hasan told reporters at the scene that the number of casualties may be higher because some of the dead and injured were taken away by relatives after the attack on the convoy entering the palace.
“Shabaab was behind the explosion. They killed eight people, including a soldier, a mother and two children. Al Shabaab massacred civilians,” he said.
Al-Shabaab, which wants to overthrow the government and impose its interpretation of Sharia law, often carries out such explosions.
Regional police chief Mucawiye Ahmed Mudey said: “We have confirmed that the car bomb exploded and killed 8 people, most of them civilians, and 7 others were injured.”
‘Martyrdom’
The organization confirmed in a brief statement that it was behind the bombing. “Majhadists carry [out] The martyrdom at the main security checkpoint of the Presidential Palace,” it said.
An eyewitness said that when the police stopped the driver for a safety check, the car bomb was detonated.
“They usually stop to check and clear the vehicle before passing the checkpoint. The car was stopped by security and it drove when there were several other cars and people passing by on the nearby road. I saw someone carrying the injury. And the dead,” said Mohamed Hassan, an eyewitness.
Government spokesman Mohamed Ibrahim Moalimuu said that among the victims was Hibaq Abukar, who was an adviser on women and human rights in the office of Prime Minister Mohamed Hussein Roble.
“She is one of the pillars of the Prime Minister’s Office [for] Women’s affairs,” he said on his Facebook page.
[ad_2]
Source link