Days after Somalia chosen a new president, a car bomb ripped through a market in Mogadishu on Sunday, killing at least 39 people and injuring more than 50 others. The car was driven by a suicide bomber, said Ahmed Abdulle Afrax, the mayor of Wadajir district where the bombing took place.
“We carried 39 dead bodies and there were many others injured,” Dr Abdikadir Abdirahman, director of the Aamin Ambulance Service, told Reuters.
The incident took place Mogadishu’s Madina district. No group has yet claimed responsibility for the blast.
As per a report in The Indian Express, a witness said he saw severed limbs and blood scattered across the market. “Bodies were piled on top of each other.” he said by phone as ambulance sirens echoed from the background.
Notably Islamic extremist rebels like al-Shabab have often carried out such attacks in Somalia before. In an audio message released by al-Shabab’s radio arm on Sunday, Sheikh Hassan Yaqub, a senior commander of the extremist group, called Somalia’s new president Mohamed Abdullahi Mohamed an “apostate” and warned Somalis against supporting him.
Mohamed, who holds both Somali and US citizenship, was elected February 8. The al-Shabab leader also referred the new president as “evil-minded,” recalling his eight-month tenure as the prime minister of Somalia in 2010 and 2011, during which the extremists lost control of Mogadishu, the capital. “Remember how much harm he inflicted upon Muslims during his time as prime minister,” said Yaqub.
