Car bomb blast claims 10 lives in Somali capital

At least ten people have been killed in a car bomb attack in Somalia’s capital city of Mogadishu, police say.

According to officials, an explosive-laden car was detonated at the gate of the Maka al-Mukarama hotel in the Somali capital on Friday.

“There are at least 10 people killed, including Somalia’s ambassador to Switzerland who was in the hotel,”

one of the security sources told AFP.

Meanwhile, another security source said some five assailants stormed the hotel after the car bomb explodes at its rear gate.

“One of them was armed with a very heavy machine gun. Most of the dead are security guards who fought the attackers,”

said the official, speaking on condition of anonymity.

It is still uncertain who was being targeted in the assault on the popular hotel, which usually hosts government officials.

Claiming responsibility for the attack, the spokesman for the al-Shabab militant group, Abdulaziz Abu Musab, said its members were “in control of the area,” adding, “Some people have been killed and others have been wounded, but we don’t have exact causality figures.”

In a similar deadly attack also claimed by al-Shabab earlier this month, one person was killed when a car bomb went off outside the same hotel in Mogadishu.

Somalia has been the scene of deadly clashes between government forces and al-Shabab elements since 2006.

The militants have been pushed out of Mogadishu and other major cities by government forces and the African Union Mission in Somalia, which is largely made up of troops from Ethiopia, Uganda, Burundi, Djibouti, Sierra Leone, and Kenya.

The militants have, however, continued to carry out attacks in Mogadishu despite being ousted from their bases in the seaside city in 2011.