An early Friday suicide car bombing at an army camp in Galmudug, a central state of Somalia, resulted in the death of two soldiers and injuries to four individuals. Among the injured were two members of the Somali federal parliament. The camp in Las Ga’amey was accommodating high-level regional and national officials, including Galmudug’s state President Ahmed Abdi Karie Qorqor.
An anonymous senior security official confirmed that while the regional president and many top local and federal authorities were unscathed, Somali parliament members Abdi Hashi Dhabancad and Senator Abdi Qeybdid sustained “slight injuries.” He detailed, “Two soldiers lost their lives preventing the vehicle from entering the premises.”
Al-Shabaab, an al-Qaeda-affiliated extremist faction in Somalia, has accepted responsibility for the assault via a statement on its promotional social media channel.
Earlier this week, a bomb blast in the region took the life of Mohamed Mohamud, a Galmudug state parliamentarian.
Persistent insecurity has troubled Somalia, primarily because of the al-Shabaab and Daesh/ISIS extremist groups. Al-Shabaab, which has been combating the Somali government and the ATMIS since 2007, escalated its attacks after Somali President Hassan Sheikh Mohamud’s declaration of an “all-out war” against the group, following his re-election last year.
