At least 11 people killed in a car bomb
attack on a police checkpoint next to a busy market in the Waberi district.
A suspected car bomb has killed at least
11 people and injured another 16 when it exploded at a police checkpoint next
to a busy market in the Somali capital, police and witnesses said.
Witnesses saw several bodies at the
scene of the blast near the vegetable market in Mogadishu's Waberi
district on Saturday, where shops and stalls were wrecked and
ambulances raced away with casualties.
"The whole market is ruined and
people perished. The death toll is sure to rise," Colonel Abdikadir Farah,
a police officer, told Reuters news agency.
Medical sources told the AFP news agency
the death toll could be as high as 30.
"There was chaos and severed dead
bodies strewn around the street. The market was so busy with people shopping
when the blast ripped through the area. I saw many dead bodies but I could not
count, I have helped collect more than 10 of them," said Abdulahi Osman,
who witnessed the blast.
No group has yet claimed responsibility
for the attack, but immediate suspicion fell on the Al-Qaeda linked group
al-Shabab, locked in battle against the Somali government and which regularly
mounts attacks in the city.
Its most deadly recent attack was in
August when a car bomb outside a popular hotel close to the presidential palace
left 15 dead.
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