At least 11 killed in suicide bomb attack in Somalia

Mogadishu, Jan 12 (EFE).- At least 11 people have been killed in a suicide car bomb blast in the Somali capital Mogadishu, police said Wednesday.

Fifteen others were wounded in the powerful explosion that took place in Waberi District, adjacent to Aden Adde International Airport.

The attack “targeted a convoy passing through a checkpoint on the eastern perimeter of the airport,” police officer Farhan Ahmed Nur told Efe.

“Eleven are confirmed dead,” Nur said, adding that the attack caused extensive material damage to vehicles and surrounding buildings.

The assault appears to have targeted a convoy belonging to the United Nations, which has an office in the Green Zone, Mogadishu’s heavily fortified area that houses embassies and the African Union peacekeeping mission to Somalia (AMISOM).

The Al-Qaeda-linked al-Shabab militant group has claimed responsibility for the attack.

The fundamentalists, who want to establish an ultra-conservative jihadist state, control rural areas in central and southern Somalia.

Al-Shabab’s deadliest attack caused the deaths of over 500 people in Mogadishu in October 2017.

Somalia has been mired in chaos since 1991 after dictator Mohamed Siad Barre was overthrown, leaving the country in the hands of Islamist militias and warlords. EFE

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