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Africa
Shoppers die in Somalia attack
Two civilians die as grenades thrown at police patrol in Mogadishu misses target.
Last Modified: 27 Jun 2007 17:08 GMT
Civilians are caught up in the violence
in Somalia[EPA]

Armed men have thrown hand grenades at a police patrol in sprawling Bakara Market in Somalia's capital, missing the truck and killing two shoppers, police and witnesses have said.
Also on Wednesday, Barre Hirale, a former defence minister, was injured in the head in an assassination attempt, said Barre Abdi, the district commissioner of Bardhere, 320km west of Mogadishu.
 
Abdi said Hirale's car was hit by a land mine, and that his driver was critically injured.
It was one in a series of assassination attempts against prominent figures in Somalia.

Abdullahi Ahmad Afrah, the country's minister for trade, said he survived an assassination attempt in Mogadishu on Tuesday night when a roadside bomb hit his body guards' car, killing one of them and injuring three others, one of them seriously.

Afrah, who was riding in another car, said: "It was an assassination attempt. But it failed. Even the targeted car was lightly damaged."

Grenade attack

At Mogadishu's Bakara market, police officer Abdi Mohamed Shino, who was in the lorry targeted by the grenades, said police opened fire after the attack and injured two civilians.

"Two civilians died in the [grenade] blast and two others, including a policeman, [were] wounded," Shino said. "I think the attackers disappeared into the market."

Abdisalan Mukhtar, who sells water at the market, said three men armed with assault rifles and two pistols arrived and hurled three hand grenades at the police.

"Then police opened fire and I saw two dead bodies lying on the ground."
Source:
Agencies
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