At least 100 people have been killed and around 300 injured after two explosions rocked the Somalian capital Mogadishu on Saturday. The two car bombs exploded outside the education ministry in Mogadishu, the country`s president said in a statement early on Sunday.
"Our people who were massacred ... included mothers with their children in their arms, fathers who had medical conditions, students who were sent to study, businessmen who were struggling with the lives of their families," President Hassan Sheikh Mohamud said after visiting the site of blast.
The first of the explosions hit the education ministry near a busy junction in Mogadishu. The second occurred as ambulances arrived and people gathered to help the victims.
The al-Qaida-linked Islamist group al-Shabab which often targets the capital and controls large parts of the country, claimed responsibility, saying it targeted the education ministry which it called an “enemy base” that receives support from non-Muslim countries.
The group also said it is committed to fighting until the country is ruled by Islamic law.
The Somalian police said the first of the explosions hit the education ministry near a busy junction in Mogadishu. On the other hand, the second one occurred as ambulances arrived and people gathered to help the victims.
The director of the Aamin ambulance service of Somalia told the AP they had collected many wounded or killed. One of the ambulances responding to the attack was destroyed by the second blast, Abdulkadir Adan added in a tweet.
The attack took place at the same place as Somalia`s largest bombing, which killed more than 500, in the same month in 2017. In that blast, a truck bomb exploded outside a busy hotel at the K5 intersection, which is lined with government offices, restaurants and kiosks.
