Five die in Mogadishu as insurgents vow more attacks during Ramadan

MOGADISHU, Sept. 3 (Xinhua) -- Five people have been killed and more than fourteen others wounded in Mogadishu after fierce skirmishes broke out between Somali government forces and insurgent fighters, witnesses said Wednesday.
"Two people died after they were hit by stray bullets in our neighborhood and four others were severely wounded," Hussein Isse, an eyewitness in Wardigley district of Mogadishu where some of the fighting took place, told Xinhua.
The fighting began after Islamist insurgent attacked government military bases around the presidential palace in Mogadishu with mortars and rocket propelled grenades while government forces responded with heavy artillery shells in and around Bakara market in the south of the restive Somali capital.
Witnesses in Bakara market, the largest in Somalia, said that two more civilians were killed by the shrapnel while six others were injured.
Somali government military spokesman confirmed that insurgent fighters attacked their positions in the early hours of the morning. He said that the fighters were repulsed back.
Meanwhile, Sheik Muqtar Robow, spokesman for Al-shabaab Islamist fighters, claimed that his fighters "inflicted heavy losses" on Somali government troops. He did not elaborate. But he said that one of his fighters was "martyred" and four others wounded in the fighting.
Speaking in a press conference by phone, Robow told reporters that his group would intensify their attacks on Somali government forces and Ethiopian troops during the holy month of Ramadan which started three days ago
"We will increase our attacks on the enemy of Allah during this holy month because we are fighting in the way of Allah and we will go to heaven should anyone of us die," Robow said.
The Al-Shabaab Islamist movement has been opposed to the agreement signed between the Somali government and a faction of the opposition coalition, the Alliance for the Reliberation of Somalia (ARS) in Djibouti in June.

Somali pirates want 'ransom' for Egypt boat and 25 crew

CAIRO (AFP) — Somali pirates who seized an Egyptian ship with 25 crew on board off Somalia's Puntland region want a ransom to be paid before freeing them, an Egyptian official said on Monday.
The pirates "want a sum of money to free the boat and the sailors," junior foreign affairs minister Ahmed Rizk told journalists, declining to specify the amount.
Rizk said last week that an Egyptian "boat has been hijacked near Eyl in the Puntland region known for its instability and the scene of many incidents of piracy."
The ministry "has information which allows for optimism about the end of the crisis," Rizk said, while the boat's owner is in constant contact with the crew who are in "a reassuring state."
Egyptian Foreign Minister Ahmed Abul Gheit has asked the Somali ambassador in Cairo to end his holidays and help end the crisis, Rizk said.
Pirates who seized a yacht with two French nationals on board in the same area said last week they wanted a "ransom" of more than one million dollars, a maritime official said.
Hijackers captured the French sailing boat Carre d'as in the Gulf of Aden on September 2 and were taking it to Eyl village, a pirate den in Somalia's semi-autonomous northern Puntland region.
French commandos carried out an operation in April and captured six pirates after Somali pirates seized a French luxury sailing ship, Le Ponant, with its 30 crew, including 22 French nationals, and held them for a week.
The waters off Somalia are the most dangerous in the world for piracy, with the International Maritime Bureau reporting 24 attacks in the area between April and June this year.