By Jennifer M. Haralambides
Impunity Watch Reporter, Africa

MOGADISHU, Somalia – A family of at least five were killed in Mogadishu when a mortar shell hit their house on Saturday.

Shortly after Ali Ahmed Jama, Somalia’s foreign minister, said the transitional government was negotiating with rebel fighters, a mortar shell hit the home of a family as they gathered for their meal at the end of the day’s Ramadan fast.

Sources say that fierce fighting exploded in the city on Friday night and Saturday morning, and witnesses claim that over 10 people have been killed, including a Somalia-American who joined the insurgents.

“We lost a martyr who was from Minnesota in the overnight raid,” said a Shabab foot solder.  Among the dead was a Somali-American identified as Mohamed Hassan, a 21 year-old from Minnesota.

“Soon after breaking fast we heard strange noises of weapons and we ran into a concrete building nearby,” said Fatima Elmi, a Mogadishu resident.

The militants causing the conflict in Somalia are the Hizbul Islam and the Shabab.  These groups are trying to overthrow Somalia’s moderate Islamic government and replace it with a regime that will impose strict Islamic Sharia law.

After Sheikh Hassan Dahir Aweys, the leader of the Hizbul Islam returned from exile in May, he built the group into a powerful force that, together with the Islamist militant group al-Shabab, has taken control of many parts of southern Somalia, including the capital of Mogadishu.

For more information, please see:

AFP – Six Civilians killed in Mogadishu Clashes – 5 September 2009

BBC – Five Die in Somalia Mortar Attack – 6 September 2009

The New York Times – Several Dead in Somali Clashes, Possibly Including U.S. Jihadist – 5 September 2009

VOA – Somali Militant Leader Says Fighting Will Continue Despite Civilian Casualties – 5 September 2009