At least 32 people have been killed and scores wounded following a suicide bombing and gun attack at a popular beach in the Somali capital of Mogadishu.
‘About 63’ civilians were injured in the attack, some of them critically, police spokesperson Abdifatah Adan Hassan told reporters, with the death count dramatically rising from seven earlier today.
Horrifying footage from the scene showed bodies strewn across the ground with injured people calling out for help as ambulance vans sped through the busy streets.
Security forces rushed in and killed ‘all five gunmen Kharijites’, police said, referring to the Al-Qaeda linked Al-Shabaab jihadist group. The organisation has been waging a bloody insurgency against the government for more than 17 years.
A sixth member of the group ‘blew himself at the beach’, officer Mohammed Omar said this morning. ‘The merciless terrorists shot civilians randomly and I saw seven dead bodies along the beach,’ he added.
Police and witnesses said the bomber detonated his device late Friday along Lido Beach – popular with business people and officials and the scene of previous attacks – before gunmen stormed the area.
Horrific scenes of the aftermath of the assault on a popular beach in Somalia on Friday night
Bodies strewn across the beach on Friday night after terrorists attacked in Mogadishu
Locals carry an injured victim from the scene in a wheelbarrow late on Friday
Scenes of commotion as ambulances rush to help victims on the beachfront on Friday night
Witnesses said there were many people at the popular location when the explosion occurred, describing how gunmen then stormed the area.
‘Everybody was panicked and it was hard to know what was happening because shooting started soon after the blast,’ witness Abdilatif Ali told AFP.
He said that people attempted take cover on the ground or flee.
‘I saw many people strewn (on the ground) and some of them were dead and others wounded,’ he said.
‘There were wounded people as well but most of the civilians were rescued by the security forces,’ officer Omar added.
Others described similar scenes, with Ahmed Yare witnessing the attack unfold from a nearby hotel.
‘I saw wounded people at the beach side, people were screaming in panic, and it was hard to notice who was dead and who was still alive,’ he told AFP.
A witness, Mohamud Moalim, told the Associated Press news agency that he saw an attacker wearing an explosive vest moments before the man ‘blew himself up next to the beach-view hotel.’
Moalim said some of his friends who were with him at the hotel were killed and others were wounded.
Another witness, Abdisalam Adam, told AP that he ‘saw many people lying on the ground’ and had helped take some injured people to the hospital.
He told a press conference police had captured one attacker alive, contrary to reports all five gunmen were killed.
‘The fact that the terrorist attack coincides with this night when the beach is the most congested shows the hostility of the terrorists to the Somali people,’ former Somali Prime Minister Hassan Ali Khaire wrote on Twitter/X.
He sent his ‘deepest condolences to the families, relatives and friends’ in the post.
‘Targeting and blasting to kill 32 members from the civilian population means these Kharijites are not going to target only government centres, soldiers and officials,’ Hassan told reporters.
Al-Shabaab claimed responsibility for the assault in a post on a pro-Shabaab website late on Friday.
People carry the dead body of an unidentified woman killed in an explosion at the beach, today
People gather as an ambulance carries the dead body of a victim of the deadly attack, today
The aftermath of a previous attack in Mogadishu, Somalia, on July 15
A woman walks past debris at a cafe in Mogadishu following a car bomb blast in July
Al-Shabaab has carried out numerous bombings and attacks in Mogadishu and other parts of the country, as the government presses on with an offensive against the Islamist militants.
The group controlled a vast area of Somalia before being pushed back in government counteroffensives since 2022.
However, the militants remain capable of launching significant attacks on government, commercial, and military targets.
The latest attack comes after five people were killed in a powerful car bomb blast at a café in the capital last month.
In March, the militants killed three people and wounded 27 in an hours-long siege of a Mogadishu hotel, breaking a relative lull in the fighting.
