Mogadishu deputy mayor survives bomb attack

Mogadishu's deputy mayor survived a roadside blast on Saturday that killed a boy and wounded at least five others, the latest Iraq-style insurgent attack in the chaotic capital. Deputy Mayor Abdifatah Ibrahim Omar has only been on the job since last month, when he replaced his father who was killed in a similar explosion in February.
"I was the target of the landmine blast, but I survived. A 10-year-old boy died on the spot. The mine exploded after I had just passed it," Omar told Reuters by telephone moments after the blast, his voice hoarse. "It was a remote-controlled landmine. The type that is nowadays often used in Mogadishu by these people."
Four of his guards and a 70-year-old man on the street were seriously wounded, he said. Another deputy mayor, Mohamed Osman, was in the car but escaped injury. Insurgents from a defeated militant Islamist movement have increasingly adopted tactics employed by Iraqi guerrillas since the interim government and its Ethiopian allies forced them out of Mogadishu in December after a brief war.
They have used roadside bombs and assassinated government officials to fight back, following two rounds of heavy battles that levelled entire neighbourhoods and killed more than 1,300 people in March and April.
Shopkeeper Nur Abdikadir said he heard a loud bang followed by smoke and flames. He closed his shop and fled. "I saw two soldiers being pulled out of the half-burning car," Abdikadir said. "The explosion was loud and terrifying. I heard gun shots immediately after the explosion. The troops were firing in panic."
Security officials said soldiers had rounded up several people found in the vicinity of the blast. Late on Friday, unidentified attackers also threw a grenade and wounded two policemen guarding Mogadishu's seaport.
"The policemen thought the assailants were jokingly throwing stones at them only to realise it was a hand grenade," port worker Abdullahi Abdi said. The insurgents, who also include some disgruntled gunmen from the city's dominant Hawiye tribe, have struck government buildings, convoys and have attacked Ugandan peacekeepers patrolling the city under an African Union mandate. Ethiopian Foreign Minister Seyoum Mesfin flew out of Mogadishu on Saturday, after arriving the day before to meet with the government about the security situation. Government sources said he was also discussing the establishment of Ethiopia's embassy to Somalia inside the Villa Baidoa presidential compound.