Reports from the secure-prone capital of federal Somalia, Mogadishu, state that a terrorist attack on one of the biggest hotels in Mogadishu is in progress.
Reports indicate that a triple blast was heard before a heavy exchange of gunfire erupted.
The first blast hit the front gate of Hotel Afrik, where, according to the reports, among the patrons was an unnamed, high military officer and a contingent of bodyguards accompanying him.
VIDEO: Smoke rising from Hotel Afrik near #Mogadishu airport as gun battle between #AlShabaab attackers and security forces continues. #Somalia pic.twitter.com/AAIbia4htn
— Morad News (@MoradNews) January 31, 2021
The second and third blasts made an entry of a number of terrorists into the inner compound of the hotel possible.
Paramilitary police have cordoned off the area and are said to be battling the assailants inside the hotel.
Casualties are reported but numbers of the dead and injured remain unknown.
Hotel Afrik is located in between Kilometer 4 and the Adan Adde International airport. It is largely frequented by high-level government officials and people returning or visiting from the Diaspora.
Hotel Afrik, along with a number of other high-class hotels, is in the same vicinity with the airport and the adjacent AMISOM Base camp of Halane and, thus, relatively more heavily guarded than the rest of the city outside Villa Somalia.
Earlier attacks on the hotel and others in the heavily populated area resulted in the death and injury of hundreds of patrons and passersby in the past.
Targeted killings had also become something of a norm of recent. on the 23rd and 24th of January alone, for instance, 9 persons – most of them young – lost their lives to such operations in the beleaguered city.
Somalia is presently reeling with a slew of problems among which is loose, sieve-like security.
The US had pulled out from Somalia earlier in the month. AMISOM is readying itself for a final exit within 2021, and the country is currently grappling with an elusive election arrangement which should have made a new or re-elected president and new MPs in place by February. Due to disagreements among stakeholders, the date set appears improbable in prevailing circumstances.
This is a developing story..
