The Spokesman for the African Union troops in Mogadishu said that that several Somali patients were killed and three AMISOM soldiers injured after a blast just outside the vicinity of AMISOM Headquarters at the airport this afternoon.
Major Barigye Ba-Huko told VOA Somali that a mortar shell landed at an out-patient’s centre run by the AMISOM forces at the airport. Other reports from Somali eyewitnesses say the explosion was caused by a device hidden in a basket.
The Somali militant group Al-Shabab said it carried out the attack and claimed that “several AMISOM soldiers and doctors” were killed in the blast.
Earlier, a team of UN and AU diplomats visited Mogadishu and had a meeting with Somali President Sheikh Sharif Sheikh Ahmed and his Prime Minister Omar Abdirashid Sharmarke.
The team had included the Special Representative of UN Secretary-General for Somalia, Ahmedou Ould-Abdallah, the African Union Commissioner for Peace and Security Ramtane Lamamra and the new AU envoy to Somalia, Boubacar Diara.
Major Ba-Huko told VOA that the delegation had already departed the airport when the blast attack happened.