Islamist militants attack African Union base in Somalia

An al-Shabab official told the BBC that its fighters had attacked the base after morning prayers, starting with a vehicle bomb before storming the facility.

“Somalia is no longer a failed state”, said Mr Mohamud, making no reference to the attack.

Col David Obonyo, Kenyan military spokesman, debunked shabab reports that the AU base had been attacked.

The bodies of Kenyan soldiers were said to have been dragged through the streets of a Somali town yesterday after fighters from al-Shabaab launched a suicide and gun attack on their African Union base.

Kenyan troops acted “to protect our country from its enemies and their sympathizers”, Kenyatta said in an e-mailed statement.

An unidentified al-Shabaab commander made the claim on Radio Andulus, a pro-al-Shabaab station that broadcasts via the Internet in the capital, Mogadishu.

The Kenya Defence Forces (KDF) said in a statement that the battle was still going on yesterday afternoon and that there were casualties on both sides. “They will claim that they have taken over the camp even though they have not”, Njuguna said.

The Shebab have also staged attacks in Kenya, killing at least 67 people at Nairobi’s Westgate Mall in 2013 and massacring 148 people at a university in Garissa in April 2015.

Al Shabaab fighters attacked a remote Somali army base and entered a nearby town close to the border with Kenya, saying they had killed dozens of soldiers who are part of the African Union Mission in Somalia.

Somali army colonel Idris Ahmed said that the assault began with a militant blowing himself up to make an opening into the base. “The other Kenyan troops have run away into the bush and we are hunting them down”. “There were many casualties between the two parties”, he added.

Witnesses reported blasts and heavy gunfire.

He said the fighting remains ongoing.

Those living in the town told the BBC that the bodies of dead soldiers had been paraded through the streets by triumphant al-Shabaab militants.