8 civilians die in Somalia hotel siege, 60 rescued

Somali security forces on Monday ended an hours-long siege by Al Qaedalinked insurgents who killed eight civilians after storming a prominent hotel in the capital Mogadishu, the police said.

Al Shabaab militants attacked the Villa Rose, a hotel popular with politicians and government officials, in a hail of bullets and explosions at around 8:00pm local time on Sunday.

The jihadists “killed eight civilians and the security forces succeeded in rescuing about 60 civilians, no one among the civilians was wounded”, police spokesman Sadik Dudishe added. “There were about six attackers involved - five of them were shot and killed by the security forces and one of them detonated himself.”