Several killed in apparent Al-Shabab attack on Somali hotel

Attackers blasted their way into a popular hotel in Somalia’s capital city of Mogadishu — the seat of the country’s Western-backed government — and killed at least nine people on Friday in an attack that was claimed by the armed group Al-Shabab, police and witnesses said.

Somali special forces broke through the wall of a compound and exchanged gunfire with fighters holed up in the main building of the Maka Al-Mukarramah hotel, police said. 

Maj. Ismail Olow, a police officer, told Reuters that "most parts of the hotel are in the hands of the government forces now but there is ... sporadic gunfire and grenades hurled from the windows of the second floor of the hotel." 

Police said the troops had killed most of the attackers.

"It is believed the attackers were nine in number. Six of them have been killed. Three are believed to be still hiding," Olow said. He said they had rescued most of the government officials, including the Somali ambassador to Switzerland, who was at the hotel.

The remains of two destroyed cars could be seen at the gates of the hotel, which was surrounded by police. The attack started when a suicide bomber detonated his explosives-laden car at the gate. Gunmen then quickly moved in, according to Police Capt. Mohamed Hussein, who said he had counted at least nine bodies at the scene.

The armed group Al-Shabab claimed responsibility for the attack.

"We are behind the Hotel Maka Al-Mukarramah attack and fighting is still going on inside the hotel," Sheikh Abdiasis Abu Musab, Al Shabaab's military operations spokesman, told Reuters earlier Friday. 

Al-Shabab routinely carries out suicide bombings, drive-by shootings and other attacks in Mogadishu. The attacks on the capital have continued despite Al-Shabab fighters being driven from their bases in the seaside city in 2011. 

Wire services