Mogadishu, Somalia, Jun 10 — The Friday night siege of a hotel in the Somali capital Mogadishu has ended, state news agency SONNA and state TV SNTV announced, without specifying casualty figures.
The security forces “neutralised” rebels who carried out “the desperate terrorist attack on the Pearl Beach… in Mogadishu,” SNTV reported on Saturday.
It added that security forces had rescued “many civilians from inside the hotel” and had shot and killed those responsible.
The Islamist Al-Shabaab group, which has been waging an insurgency against the internationally backed federal government for more than 15 years, claimed responsibility for the attack.
While the group has been driven out of Somalia’s main towns and cities, it retains power in large swathes of rural areas, and continues to carry out attacks against security and civilian targets, including in the capital.
Hotels have often been targeted in the past as they tend to host high-ranking Somali and foreign officials.
