By Ibrahim Mohamed
Monday, September 15, 2008
The dead soldier was the second Ugandan to be killed by a bomb in the anarchic city in as many days.
"Our troops went out on inspection as normal and an improvised explosive device went off, killing one of our soldiers and injuring two others," Major Barigye Ba-Hoku, spokesman for the small AU force, told Reuters.
Seven Ugandan troops and a Burundian soldier have been killed by near-daily violence rocking the Somali capital.
Since the start of last year, Islamist insurgents have waged an Iraq-style rebellion of roadside bombs, assassinations and artillery attacks targeting the U.N.-backed interim government and its Ethiopian military allies.
Local man Ali Hussein witnessed Monday's blast: "There was lots of smoke and several soldiers were lying on the ground."
The 2,200 AU peacekeepers are mostly restricted to guarding Mogadishu's vital air and sea ports, as well as the strategic K4 junction and hilltop Villa Somalia presidential palace.
They have been unable to stem the chaos raging around them, and the pan-African body wants to hand over to U.N. troops.
One hardline Islamist group, al Shabaab, has vowed to stop planes landing at the city's airport after midnight on Tuesday.
Al Shabaab appears to have stepped up its attacks, and widened its sphere of targets, since being put on the United States' list of terrorist organisations earlier this year.
Exposing a rift in the opposition, a spokesman for the broader Islamic Courts group, rejected the ban on the airport.
"Civilians like pilgrims, business people and ill patients are served by the airport," said Sheikh Abdirahim Isse Adow.
"We therefore urge the group that want to close it, to think again and consider our suffering people."
Somalia's civil war has killed more than 8,000 civilians since last year -- and an unknown number of combatants. Another 1 million people have been forced from their homes by fighting.
Source: Reuters, Sept 15, 2008