Mogadishu, May 15: Twenty Somali soldiers lost their lives in a fierce gun battle between al-Shabab fighters and transitional government troops in the Hodan district of southern Mogadishu late on Friday.
The skirmishes continued until the crack of dawn, the Media correspondent in Mogadishu reported on Saturday.
In addition, 15 civilians were killed as the two sides exchanged heavy gunfire and barrages of mortar shells were fired. More than 25 people also sustained injuries during the bloody skirmishes.
Somali ambulance workers said they ferried the wounded to different hospitals in Mogadishu.
Somalia has not had a functioning government since 1991, when warlords overthrew former dictator Mohamed Siad Barre.
Over the past two decades, up to one million people have lost their lives in the fighting between rival factions and due to famine and disease.
There are more than 1.4 million internally displaced people (IDPs) in Somalia, and over 300,000 IDPs are sheltering in Mogadishu alone.
Most of the displaced live in poor and degrading conditions on makeshift sites in southern and central Somalia, according to the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees.
——–Agencies