By Yassin Juma
MOGADISHU
The Al-Qaeda-linked Al-Shabaab militant group said Friday that its "elite fighters" had managed to kill 17 people in a Christmas Day attack on the African Union Mission in Somalia (AMISOM)'s largest base camp in Mogadishu.
The group also threatened to stage additional attacks on African peacekeepers deployed in fractious Somalia.
"This attack sends a clear message to African crusaders and western mercenaries," Al-Shabaab said in a statement. "You will find no safe haven in the Muslim land of Somalia."
Al-Shabaab, which has long been fighting government troops and African peacekeepers, added that the attack on the Halane camp base had been carried out in retaliation for the "martyrdom" of group leader Sheikh Mukhtar Abu Zubeyr.
It asserted that Thursday's attack on the base had also come as revenge for the death of "hundreds of innocent Muslims" who the group claimed had been tortured at the AMISOM base camp.
The group said two westerners – who it referred to as "white mercenaries" – had also been killed in Thursday's attack.
Al-Shabaab also acknowledged that some of its fighters – it did not give an exact number – had been killed in the attack, while a number of others had returned safely.
"They are now preparing for their next operation," the group said. "Expect to hear from us again."
Earlier Friday, AMISOM said it had managed to foil the attack on the camp, killing two of the attackers in the process. A total of eight attackers and five peacekeepers had been killed, the mission added.
Somalia has remained in the grip of on-again, off-again violence since the outbreak of civil war in 1991.
Earlier this year, fractious Somalia appeared to inch closer to stability after government troops and African Union forces – deployed in the country since 2007 – drove Al-Shabaab from most of its strongholds.
www.aa.com.tr/en
