Thursday, July 10, 2008
The attack came two days after a deadly insurgent assault on the presidential palace area in Baidoa, a city 250 kilometres (155 miles) northwest of Mogadishu and home to the country's transitional parliament.
"The attack occurred around midnight at Daynunay military camp outside Baidoa and it left two soldiers died. Two other civilians were also wounded in the village," said local government official Abukar Hasan Moalim.
Deputy Baidoa governor Shine Moalim Nurow also confirmed the attack but could not immediately provide a casualty toll.
The Shebab militant group claimed responsibility for the latest attack.
"We took control of the biggest military post for the Ethiopian puppets outside Baioda and they fled. We slaughtered several of them and burned down a military water tank in that camp" Sheikh Mukhtar Robow, a Shebab leader and spokesman, told AFP.
In late 2006, Ethiopian troops came to the rescue of an embattled Somali transitional government and soon ousted Islamist forces which had briefly controlled large parts of the country.
The Shebab group has since waged a guerrilla war against government forces, Ethiopian troops and African Union peacekeepers.
The latest attack came as a deadline expired for the implementation of a truce agreement initialed in Djibouti on June 9 between the federal government and top leaders from the main Islamist-dominated opposition movement.
The deal gave all sides a month to start enforcing a cessation of hostilities but it was promptly rejected by Islamist hardliners, including the Shebab, who insist Ethiopian forces should withdraw before any talks start.
Source: AFP, July 10, 2008