Militants in Somalia bomb U.N. van, killing 7

MOGADISHU, Somalia — Islamist extremists set off a bomb in a U.N. van in normally tranquil northern Somalia on Monday, killing at least seven people, including four employees of the U.N. children’s agency in an attack that was widely denounced.

Two Kenyans, one Ugandan, one Afghan and three Somalis died in the explosion in Garowe town and one American, one Sierra Leonean, one Ugandan, one Kenyan and four Somalis were wounded, police Col. Ali Salad said.

Somali President Hassan Sheikh Mohamud called it a direct attack on the future of the country.

“This attack is not just targeted at the United Nations, but in attacking UNICEF, al-Shabab has also attacked Somali children. It is an attack against the future of our country and I condemn it in the strongest possible terms,” Mohamud said in a statement.

Al-Shabab, which is battling to convert Somalia into a hard-line Islamic state, claimed responsibility through its radio station for the attack in Garowe, capital of Puntland state.

The bomb was apparently planted under a seat and was detonated by remote control, said police official Yusuf Ali.

Al-Shabab claimed responsibility for an attack earlier this month at a college in northeastern Kenya in which at least 148 people, most of them students, were killed. Kenya has sent troops into Somalia as part of the African Union force to stabilize the government and attack al-Shabab, which is allied with al-Qaida.