The death toll from the attack by Al-Shabaab on a hotel in central Somalia where clan leaders were meeting on Tuesday has risen to 10, a police officer in the town confirmed on Wednesday. Most of the victims were civilians.
Attackers from the Al-Qaeda-linked group struck the hotel in Beledweyne yesterday with a car bomb before its gunmen entered the building and engaged in a day-long siege with government forces trying to flush them out.
Clan elders from the Hiran region had gathered in the hotel for a meeting to discuss ways of countering Al-Shabaab before the attack, for which the militant group claimed responsibility. A clan elder had earlier put the death toll at seven.
“The siege was concluded last night at midnight. Four attackers blew themselves up and the other two were shot dead,” police Major Nur Aden told Reuters from Beledweyne, which is the regional capital. “Ten people died in the hospital, including elders and soldiers, mostly civilians.”
A resident who lives next to the hotel, Ahmed Ismail, said gunfire had died down at around midnight.
Al-Shabaab often conducts bomb and gun attacks in the fragile Horn of Africa nation as part of a campaign launched nearly two decades ago to topple the government and establish its own rule based on its strict interpretation of Islamic law. The group released a statement saying that its fighters had killed 20 people, including soldiers and elders. It gave no details of its own casualties. The numbers it gives often differ from those of officials and local witnesses.
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