Dozens killed in attack on beach hotel by al-Qaeda terrorists

'I was in the restaurant sipping coffee and having a good chat with friends when I saw a big man running, in a second there was something like lightning and a huge blast.'

An attack on a beach hotel in Somalia has killed 32 people and injured more than 60 others.

The attack happened at a hotel on Lido Beach in Mogadishu, the African nation’s capital, on Friday.

One soldier was killed in the attack, with the rest of the victims being civilians, while another soldier was wounded.

Witness Mohamud Moalim described an attacker wearing an explosive vest moments before he ‘blew himself up next to the beach-view hotel’.

He said some of the friends he was with at the hotel were killed or wounded in the blast.

Another witness, Abdisalam Adam, said he ‘saw many people lying on the ground’ and had helped take some wounded people to the hospital.

The explosion was then followed by gunfire, witnesses say.

al-Shabab, an East Africa affiliate of the al-Qaeda terror group, has claimed responsibility for the attack.

Somali police say one attacker blew himself up while three others were killed by security forces and one was captured alive.

The Lido Beach area has in the past been targeted by militants allied to al-Shabab. The most recent attack last year killed nine people.

It’s an extremely popular area of the capital, bustling on Friday nights with Somalis enjoying their weekends.

Hassan Farah, a survivor, was in a restaurant when the attack began.

He said: ‘I was in the restaurant sipping coffee and having a good chat with friends when I saw a big man running, in a second there was something like lightning and a huge blast.

‘We were covered with smoke. Inside and outside the restaurant many people were lying on the floor while others were bleeding and crying.’

This is the deadliest attack seen in Somalia since two car bombs exploded near a busy market in October 2022, killing at least 100 people and injuring 300 others.

In a separate attack on Saturday, local media reported seven people died after a passenger vehicle hit a roadside bomb some 25 miles from the capital.

al-Shabab still controls parts of southern and central Somalia and continues to carry out attacks in Mogadishu and other areas while extorting millions of pounds a year from residents and businesses in its quest to impose an Islamic state.

Somali President Hassan Sheikh Mohamud last year declared a ‘total war’ on the militants as the country starts taking charge of its own security.

Yesterday’s attack came a month after Somalia started the third phase of the drawdown of peacekeeping troops under the the African Union Transition Mission.

Following the Lido Beach attack, President Hassan Sheikh Mohamud shared a statement which read: ‘The government is determined to eliminate the terrorists. The terrorists want to terrify the civilians. Let the civilians report the terrorists hiding among them.’

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