Death toll in Mogadishu multiple bombings hit 30

The death toll in the Friday multiple bombings targeting Sahafi Hotel has risen to 30, medical sources have said.

The free emergency service, Aamin Ambulance told Goobjoog News the number had climbed as some of those critically injured succumbed to their injuries while more bodies were collected from the scene of the attack.

“I transported 20 bodies and three injured people to Digfer, Medina and Daru Shifa hospitals,” Bashir Hassan Farah from Aamin Ambulance said. “The number has gone up to 30.”

Most of those caught up in the attack were passengers plying the busy KM4-KM5 stretch where Sahafi Hotel and CID headquarters are located opposite to each other. The first bomb went off at about 4.27 pm followed by a second one about three minutes later and a third at about 4.45pm.

A third blast went off some ten minutes later.

The owner of Sahafi Hotel Abdifatah Abdirashid who inherited the business from his father  killed in a similar attack in 2015 died alongside three of this bodyguards.

Four of the militants who had attempted to make way into the hotel were shot dead by security guards of the hotel and forces from the CID headquarters. The militants were clad in uniforms resembling those of Mogadishu Stabilisation Force, an outfit formed following the October 2017 truck bombing but later disbanded.