Two truck bombs have exploded in one of the busiest areas of Somalia’s capital, the same place where 300 people were killed in another 2017 truck bomb attack.
At least 100 people died this Saturday and 300 were injured in the attack with two car bombs perpetrated against the Ministry of Education in the capital of Somalia, Mogadishu, as confirmed today by the Somali president, Hassan Sheikh Mohamud.
The Ministry is located near Zobe intersection, also known as K-5 and one of the busiest in Mogadishu. The Zobe intersection was the same place where a attack with two truck bombs on October 14, 2017which killed more than 500 people and injured more than 300 in the worst terrorist attack in Somalia’s history.
“Our people who were massacred, including mothers with their children in their arms, fathers who suffered from medical conditions, students who were sent to study, businessmen who were fighting for the lives of their families,” said Mohamud, who has blamed the jihadist group Al Shabab, affiliated since 2012 with Al Qaeda of the “cruel and cowardly terrorist attack”.
Image after the attack in Mogadishu. Photo: EFE
President Mohamud declared on August 23 a “total war” to “eliminate” Al Shabab, whose members took over a hotel in Mogadishu days before for 30 hours and killed 21 people.
Since then, several US-backed military operations have been carried out against the fundamentalists. Al Shabab often commits terrorist attacks in Mogadishu and other parts of Somalia to overthrow the central government -backed by the international community- and establish by force a Wahhabi (ultra-conservative) Islamic State- The jihadist group controls rural areas of the center and south of Somalia and also attacks neighboring countries such as Kenya and Ethiopia.
Somalia has been in a state of war and chaos since 1991, when dictator Mohamed Siad Barre was overthrown, leaving the country without an effective government and in the hands of Islamist militias and warlords.
Source: Eitb
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