A few days of relative calm were shattered in the Somali capital Mogadishu on Friday when fresh clashes broke out between Islamist insurgents and government forces, killing at least four people, including a prominent journalist, dpa reported. Witnesses said that government forces attacked insurgent positions in three different locations in north Mogadishu and that the warring parties exchanged mortar fire. "Two people, including a child, died and others were injured after a shell landed in their home," Adder Hussein, a resident in Holwadaag district, told the German Press Agency dpa. "I can still hear gunfire." Another witness said he saw the body of a dead government soldier lying in the street, while casualties were streaming into hospitals. "We have admitted 12 wounded since this morning, but the casualties keep coming hour by hour," Dahir Dhere, deputy director of Medina Hospital, told dpa. Almost 200 people, many of them civilians, have died and over 500 have been injured since the fighting began. According to the UN, over 45,000 people have fled Mogadishu in the same period.
