MOGADISHU: A suicide bomber attacked a stadium in Somalia’s central city of Galkayo Friday, killing 15 people shortly before the arrival of the country’s new prime minister, according to police.
Ali Hassan, a police officer in Galkayo, said others were injured in the blast, which occurred at the entrance to the sports stadium. Some high-ranking members of the Somali army were among those killed in the explosion, according to local reports.
Prime Minister Mohamed Hussein Roble, who took office in September, was on his way to address the rally at a stadium in Galkayo, a town in central Somalia where many residents and security forces had gathered to welcome him before the explosion, Galmudug state security ministry said in a post on its Facebook page.
Senior officials at the site included General Abdiasis Abdullahi Qooje who was commander of a battalion based in Galmudug, Somali state radio SONNA reported.
Somalia’s Al-Qaeda-allied Islamist group Al-Shabab, claimed responsibility for the attack and said it was “targeting the apostate prime minister who was visiting the town.”
Among those killed, Al-Shabab’s military operations spokesman, Abdiasis Abu Musab said, some were US-trained.
The group has been fighting for more than a decade to topple the Horn of Africa’s central government and establish its own rule based on its strict interpretation of sharia law.
Farah Ali, a resident of Galkayo who witnessed the bombing, told Reuters in a phone interview the stadium was packed with a huge crowd before the blast.
“I counted seven dead people including soldiers and civilians and over a dozen injured,” he said.
Suicide bomb attack targeting Somalia prime minister’s visit kills at least 15
https://arab.news/b6xr4
Suicide bomb attack targeting Somalia prime minister’s visit kills at least 15
- Bomb exploded at rally site in Galkayo before Prime Minister Mohamed Hussein Roble reached the place
Bangladesh summons Myanmar envoy after border clashes
- A dozen villages in Bangladesh’s Cox’s Bazar district have been affected by the violence
DHAKA: Bangladesh on Tuesday summoned the ambassador of Myanmar after civil war gun battles in the neighboring country spilled over the border, wounding a Bangladeshi girl.
Heavy fighting in Myanmar’s Rakhine state this month has involved junta soldiers, Arakan Army fighters and Arakan Rohingya Salvation Army militia guerrillas.
Authorities said around a dozen villages in Bangladesh’s Cox’s Bazar district have been affected by the violence.
Twelve-year-old Huzaifa Afnan was struck by a bullet, while a Bangladeshi fisherman had his leg ripped off after stepping on a landmine near the frontier.
“Bangladesh reminded that the unprovoked firing towards Bangladesh is a blatant violation of international law and a hindrance to good neighborly relations,” a Foreign Ministry press statement said.
Myanmar’s ambassador to Bangladesh, U Kyaw Soe Moe, was summoned to the Foreign Ministry on Tuesday, where he expressed sincere sympathy to the injured victims and their families.
“My daughter was supposed to go to school, but she is on a ventilator,” Afnan’s father Jasim Uddin said. “My heart is bleeding for my baby girl.”
More than a million Rohingya have fled their homes in Myanmar, many after a 2017 military crackdown, and now eke out a living in sprawling refugee camps just across the border in Bangladesh.
ARSA, a Rohingya armed group formed to defend the persecuted Muslim minority, has been fighting the Myanmar military, as well as rival Arakan Army guerrillas.
On Monday, Bangladeshi border forces detained 53 ARSA fighters who had crossed the frontier.
Bangladeshi police officer Saiful Islam, commander of the local Teknaf station, said all detainees were being held in jail, except one fighter who was receiving hospital treatment for bullet wounds.
“These individuals have a history of living in the refugee camps in Cox’s Bazar and crossing into Myanmar,” Islam told AFP.
