Somalia Presidential Palace ‘Back Under Control’

{{Al-Qaeda-linked militants al-Shabaab attacked the Somali presidential palace compound on Friday, blasting through a gate with a car bomb and engaging in a fierce gun battle with African peacekeepers, police said.}}

Somali Islamist militant group al-Shabaab claimed responsibility for the attack on the heavily fortified compound in Mogadishu, known as Villa Somalia, but the Somali president Hassan Sheikh Mohamud was unharmed.

“President just called me to say he’s unharmed. Attack on Villa Somalia had failed. Sadly some lives lost,” the UN Special Representative Nick Kay wrote on his official Twitter feed.

It was not immediately clear how many people were killed.

In the past few weeks, Mogadishu has been hit by a series of suicide bomb attacks claimed by al-Shabaab, who were pushed out of the city in mid-2011 but have continued to wage a sustained guerrilla campaign.

Friday’s battle took place at the house of Somalia’s top military commander, General Dahir Aden Indha Qarshe, located in the same compound and near the presidential palace building, Abdikadir Ahmed, a senior police officer, told media.

{reuters}