Six civilians have been killed and 10 injured after al-Shabab militants attacked a beachside hotel in the Somali capital, Mogadishu, police say.
Security forces rescued more than 80 guests from the Pearl Beach hotel after a six-hour siege on Friday night.
Three members of the security forces died in the rescue operation and have been praised for their bravery.
All of the attackers were killed in a fierce gun battle with security forces, police said.
Pearl Beach hotel was popular with government officials. Such places are frequently targeted by al-Shabab insurgents, who have been fighting Somalia’s government for more than a decade, and retain a stronghold in parts of the country.
People who were caught up in this latest attack described the shocking moment armed men stormed the complex.
“I was sitting near the beach when the first explosion happened at the front gate of the hotel and there was another one at the back,” eyewitness, Hussein Saddam, told the Reuters news agency.
“I saw four dead bodies – two were women and the two others were men… It was a very shocking scene but Allah has saved me.”
The Pearl Beach hotel attack comes weeks after al-Shabab militants killed dozens of Ugandan soldiers, who were part of an African Union peacekeeping mission 110km (68 miles) south of the capital in the Lower Shabelle region.
In an audacious appointment, Somalia’s new government has included a former al-Shabab militant, who once fought against the authorities, in the cabinet, but the weekend’s deadly hotel siege is a reminder of the tough task ahead for those in power.
When Somalia’s new President, Hassan Sheikh Mohamud, took office in May, he declared a top priority was bringing an end to the country’s 15-year Islamist insurgency.
Three months later, al-Shabab staged one of its most spectacular ever attacks, storming a hotel a short drive away from the presidential palace in the capital, Mogadishu.
They held it for 30 hours. Officials said more than 20 people died in the siege of the Hayat and 117 were injured. Less than a month earlier, the group mounted an unprecedented invasion of neighbouring Ethiopia. —Reuters
