Bodies dragged in streets as 8 killed in Mogadishu battle
Somali women throw stones at the smoldering body of a goverment soldier after he was killed during heavy fighting in Mogadishu yesterday.
MOGADISHU, Wednesday
Somali insurgents dragged soldiers’ bodies through the streets of Mogadishu before burning them Wednesday when at least eight people were killed and scores injured in heavy fighting, witnesses said.
Somali women throw stones at the smoldering body of a goverment soldier after he was killed during heavy fighting in Mogadishu yesterday. (AP Photo).
The corpses of at least five soldiers – either from the Somali government army or their Ethiopian allies – were desecrated during some of the worst clashes in the lawless capital since the interim government took over in December.
In one place, two corpses were dragged by the feet, pelted with stones and kicked while a crowd chanted “God is Great”, a Reuters reporter said. In another, three bodies were hauled round by rope, kicked and then also set alight, witnesses said.
The grisly scenes recalled the aftermath of the 1993 shooting-down of a Black Hawk helicopter by Somali militiamen during a failed US operation to hunt down warlords.
Images of dead American troops being dragged through the streets of Mogadishu were the beginning of the end for a US-UN peacekeeping force which quit Somalia in 1995. Witnesses and medical sources put the combined death toll at eight by early afternoon and there were fears the actual number could be higher.
Wednesday’s fighting, which wounded at least 65 people according to hospital staff, began when insurgents fired at Ethiopian and government forces in tanks, residents said.
“I have never seen or experienced the kind of fighting that I saw today. People were running in all directions. I saw an old man die in front of me,” said Faduma Elmi, 80.
After being attacked, the tanks responded with four cannon shots, they said. The Ethiopians also fired rockets at Mogadishu stadium where residents said some insurgents had dug in.
The interim government took over Mogadishu in late December during a brief war in which it and Ethiopia routed a militant Islamist group that ruled most of south Somalia for the last half of 2006.
Many believe the defeated Islamists, along with disgruntled clan and warlord militiamen, are behind regular hit-and-run attacks. The fighting initially broke out near a government base in the former defence ministry headquarters. Insurgents have repeatedly struck at government and Ethiopian soldiers based there.
This government is the 14th attempt at establishing central rule since warlords ended it by toppling dictator Mohamed Siad Barre in 1991, ushering in an era of anarchy and violence. African Union peacekeepers from Uganda are trying to help the government gain control.
Reuters
