Islamist Shebab gunmen killed around 20 people in a popular beachside restaurant in Somalia, the police said on Friday, as neighbouring Kenya mourned soldiers killed by the Al Qaeda-linked group last
Islamist Shebab gunmen killed around 20 people in a popular beachside restaurant in Somalia, the police said on Friday, as neighbouring Kenya mourned soldiers killed by the Al Qaeda-linked group last week.
In the attack in Mogadishu, five gunmen detonated a bomb before storming the busy restaurant and spraying gunfire at terrified customers late on Thursday.
“They killed nearly 20 people, including women and children,” Somali police officer Mohamed Abdirahman said, describing it as a “barbaric and brutal attack against innocent civilians”.
The Shebab, which is fighting to overthrow the internationally-backed government in Mogadishu, carries out regular attacks in the capital, as well as against African Union troops in the countryside.
Somali Prime Minister Omar Abdirashid Sharmarke condemned the “savage” attack.
Last week the insurgents stormed a Kenyan Army base at El-Adde in southwest Somalia, in the latest incident of an AU Mission in Somalia base being overrun by the group.
A Shebab statement said that more than 100 Kenyan soldiers based at the mission were killed and others captured.
Kenya has so far refused to say how many of its soldiers were killed, injured or remain missing. Kenyan President Uhuru Kenyatta on Friday visited wounded soldiers.
