Mogadishu clashes leave 20 dead, 15 wounded

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Mogadishu clashes leave 20 dead, 15 wounded


Mogadishu, Somali Militants, Somalia, Somali capital, Ethiopia, Ethiopian troops, Islamic Militants


MOGADISHU, Nov. 21 (Xinhua) -- Heavy fighting between insurgent fighters and Somali government forces and Ethiopian troops in the Somali capital of Mogadishu has left nearly 20 people dead and almost 15 others wounded, police and witnesses said Friday.

Fifteen people, most of them young men, were killed after a gunfight between Somali government security forces and heavily armed fighters, who attacked the home of a Somali government official in the southwest of the restive capital, witnesses said.

It is not yet clear who the dead were but police spokesman, Colonel Abdulahi Hassan Barise, claimed that they were insurgent fighters.

Barise said his forces lost two men while four others were wounded in the gunfight that lasted for nearly two hours.

In separate clashes involving Ethiopian and insurgent fighters in the northeast of Mogadishu, three civilians were killed and 11 others were wounded after stray shells and bullets hit residential areas away from the battle scenes, witnesses told local media.

The escalation in fighting between insurgent fighters and Somali government forces and their Ethiopian allies comes on the day the Ethiopian troops were expected to withdraw from some of their bases in Mogadishu in accordance with a peace agreement between Somali government and a faction of the opposition Alliance for the Reliberation of Somalia (ARS) signed in Djibouti last month.



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