TWO EXPLOSIONS NEAR THE OFFICE OF A MEMBER OF PARLIAMENT KILL 15 PEOPLE IN SOMALIA

At least 15 people were killed when two car bombs exploded outside the office of a member of the federal parliament in the town of Mahas in Somali on Wednesday. This was reported by the Somali Guardian news portal, Kazinform reports with reference to TASS.

According to the source, the victims include officials. Garowe Online, a Somalian news portal, reported that the attacks were committed by suicide bombers. The authorities blamed the Al-Shabaab group for the attack.

Mahas town is located in the Hiran region in central Somalia, 300 km north of Mogadishu.

Al-Shabaab originated in Somalia in 2004. Since 2008, its militants have periodically staged bombings and ambush attacks. By 2010, the group controlled vast areas, but in the summer of 2011 it was forced to leave Mogadishu and move on to guerrilla warfare with the national government and its allies. In February 2012, one of the leaders of Al-Shabab announced that he had joined the terrorist organization Al-Qaeda (banned in the Republic of Kazakhstan, the Russian Federation and a number of other countries). Al-Shabaab is believed to have 10,000 fighters.