(Garowe Online) – Somali rebels waging war on the country’s interim government and its foreign backers have managed to intensify their violent campaign, despite a heavy-handed crackdown last month by allied Somali and Ethiopian Woyanne armed forces.
Heavy fighting erupted in parts of the capital Mogadishu Wednesday evening after armed groups launched a guerrilla attack on an Ethiopian Woyanne army base at the former ministry of defense, witnesses said.
Insurgents used machineguns and rockets in the 30-minute battle. Ethiopian Woyanne soldiers fought back and eventually chased the attackers into surrounding neighborhoods.
Casualty reports could not be confirmed, but the evening attack happened hours after more than 20 mortars rammed into different parts of Mogadishu, including Shirkole and Yaaqshiid neighborhoods.
Ethiopian Woyanne troops based at the Shirkale military compound vacated the premises today, leaving the compound under the control of 1,500 Somali soldiers who recently completed military training in Ethiopia.
Unconfirmed reports said a police station in north Mogadishu’s Kaaraan area was attacked, although police sources at the station contacted by Garowe Online said they cannot talk “due to current circumstances.”
Earlier Wednesday, two suspects detained in connection with the November assassination of a district commissioner escaped a jail in Mogadishu.
Inside sources said the suspects’ escape came after insurgent groups fighting the government gave an undisclosed amount of cash to jail officials, who accepted and secretly released the prisoners.
In Somalia’s central Hiran region, Governor Yusuf Daboged narrowly escaped a roadside bomb in the provincial capital Beletwein midday Wednesday, officials said.
Governor Daboged refused to speak to the media afterwards, but police officials said the bomb was intended to target the governor’s convoy as it drove through town.
The governor was inspecting city offices and local jails when the explosion occurred, regional officials said.
The Somali government and its Ethiopian Woyanne backers have struggled to maintain order in Mogadishu and other parts of the country, due to armed opposition from clan factions and Islamist guerrillas.