11 Somali soldiers were killed in an Al-Shabaab attack on a military unit

Eleven soldiers were killed in an attack on a Somali army camp claimed by Al-Shabaab, according to a local militia commander, a day after the government announced it was retaking a strategic city.

“The terrorists first detonated a vehicle loaded with explosives and then attacked a military camp in Hawadli,” 60 kilometers north of the capital, Mogadishu, said Mohamed Othman, commander of a local militia allied with the authorities.

He added that 11 members of the army were killed in the attack, including the commander of a military unit, adding that “dozens of terrorists” were also killed.

This comes as the Somali army regained control of a “strategic” coastal city that had been occupied for more than a decade by the extremist movement Al-Shabaab, the Somali prime minister announced on Monday.

Since 2010 Harardere, a port city 500 km north of the capital Mogadishu, has been under the control of al-Shabaab, linked to al-Qaeda.

“It is a historic victory,” Prime Minister Hamzah Abdi Barre said on Monday, “the brave members of the national armed forces have liberated the strategic port city of Harardere.”

He added: “2023 will be the year of freedom, the elimination of the youth movement and our whole country will be liberated.”

Since 2007, the youth movement has been fighting the federal government supported by the international community. After being expelled from major cities across the country between 2011 and 2012, its fighters settled in large rural areas.

Hassan Sheikh Mahmoud’s government, which has promised to launch an “all-out war” against this extremist group, sent army forces, including special forces, in September in support to the armed forces known as “Makawisli”.

And he allowed this campaign, backed by the strength of the African Union in Somalia, and from US air raids, to recover large areas in two states in the center of the country, Hirshabelle, where the province of Hiran is located, and Galmudug. But Al-Shabaab continues to launch bloody revenge attacks.

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