Ten killed as Al-Shabaab seizes control of town in Somalia

Prior to the takeover, Al-Shabaab fired a number of mortar shells at military bases in Ba’adwayn located approximately 20 kilometers away from Jiic-dheere, which fell to the terrorists’ hands.

News Keydmedia Online
17 February 2021

MOGADISHU, Somalia – The Al-Qaeda-linked Al-Shabaab wrested control of a strategic town in central Somalia amid political tension in the long-chaotic Horn of Africa nation.

Al-Shabaab has retaken Jiic-dheere, a small town near Ba’adwayn in the center of the country’s Mudug region after it was abandoned by government troops, residents said on Wednesday.

Fighting broke out in the area following the Al-Shabaab attack which left at least 10 people dead, the deadliest assault almost a month after government troops ousted the insurgents.

Prior to the takeover, Al-Shabaab fired a number of mortar shells at military bases in Ba’adwayn located approximately 20 kilometers away from Jiic-dheere, which fell to the terrorists’ hands.

Al Shabaab has been waging an insurgency for a decade to topple Somalia’s Western-backed government in Mogadishu which is largely being protected by 22,000 AU forces from neighboring Kenya, Uganda, Burundi, Djibouti, and Ethiopia.

Despite losing significant ground, including Mogadishu in 2011, Al-Shabaab remains a formidable threat to national security with its fighters often carrying out bombings in the capital and other key towns.

The country’s leaders failed to restore law and order as well as hold timely election at the end of the current government led by Farmajo whose mandate expired on Feb. 8 of this year.

KON English News Desk