The East African country’s president has blamed the attacks on the Al-Shabaab militant group
At least 100 people were killed and 300 wounded in twin car bombings in Somalia’s capital Mogadishu on Saturday, the East African country’s president has said.
Hassan Sheikh Mohamud announced the figures on Sunday, warning that “the number for both the dead and wounded continues to increase.”
The first blast targeted the Education Ministry located near the busy Zobe junction in the capital, with the second bomb going off minutes later as ambulances arrived and people gathered to assist the wounded.
Witnesses said many of the victims were women, and some were children.
The same area was the scene of a major terrorist attack in 2017, when an explosive-laden truck blew up, killing more than 500 people.
The president described the fresh bombings as “history,” saying: “it is the same place, and the same innocent people involved.”
No group has claimed responsibility for the attacks, but Mohamud has blamed them on the militant group Al-Shabaab. “This is not right. God willing, they will not be having an ability to do another Zobe incident,” he said.
The twin bombings occurred on the same day that Somalia’s president, prime minister and other senior officials gathered to discuss efforts to tackle violent extremism in the country. When he came to power in May, Mohamud vowed to wage an “all-out war” against jihadists, launching a major offensive against Al-Shabaab.
The al-Qaeda-affiliated group was driven out of Mogadishu in 2011 by African Union forces, but still controls large areas of the countryside and frequently stages bombings and gun attacks in Mogadishu and other parts of the country.
RT (Russia Today) is a state-owned news organization funded by the Russian government. The information provided by this news source is being included by the Libertarian Hub not as an endorsement of the Russian government, but rather because it is being actively censored by Big Tech, Western governments and the corporate press. During times of conflict it is imperative that we have access to both sides of the story so we can form our own opinions, even if both sides are spewing their own propaganda. The censorship of RT, despite likely being a propaganda outfit for the Russian government, reduces our ability to hear one side of the conflict. For that reason, the Libertarian Hub will temporarily republish the RSS feed from RT. Visit https://rt.com
