Somalia: Fears Grow for Children as Fighting Intensifies


More than a dozen children have been killed and injured on a sixth day of fierce fighting between militias loyal to a newly formed anti-terrorism group, and an ally of Islamic Sharia courts in Mogadishu.

The latest fatalities included a pregnant woman and three children whose house was hit by a mortar. An artillery shelling hit a house twice, killing five members of the same family, including two children.

Thousands of children and their families were compelled to flee, abandoning their houses and narrowly escaping death. These displaced people are fleeing without a fixed destination to find a safe place. All groups are using anti-aircraft missiles, machine gun mortars with indiscriminate shelling. These painful events coincide with a severe drought already causing humanitarian disaster to children in war ravaged Somalia.

There are growing fears that an imminent, larger scale civil war may break out in Mogadishu if the warring factions are not brought to the negotiating table to defuse the tensions. Otherwise, a humanitarian catastrophe will result which will affect thousands of children.

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