Twin suicide bombs kill 20 in Somali town

Two suicide bombers detonated car bombs at a government headquarters and a marketplace in a Sunday morning attack in Somalia, killing at least 20 people and wounding more than 30 others, police officials said.

Abdisalam Yusuf, a police official, said one bomber crashed an explosive-laden car by the gate of the local government in Galkayo in Somalia’s semiautonomous Puntland region. The second attacker detonated his car bomb in the nearby marketplace.

Col. Muse Hassan, a senior police officer, said officials discovered some bodies in nearby houses also ravaged by the blast. The town’s main hospital received more than 15 of the injured people.

“Some of them were burnt beyond recognition,” said Abdikareem Ali, a nurse at the hospital. “It was a dark day.”

Extremist group al-Shabaab claimed responsibility for the attacks. Somalia has battled with al-Shabaab’s insurgency since 2006. The extremist group has launched attacks on African Union peacekeeping bases and countries that contribute to the force, including Kenya and Ethiopia. The 22,000-member peacekeeping force has pushed al-Shabaab out of the capital, Mogadishu, but the terror group still continues its attacks.

Galkayo town rarely sees attacks from al-Shabaab. But the group’s presence is becoming more active in the region as security forces continue to push it out of its strongholds.

Somalia’s Prime Minister Omar Abdirashid Sharmarke condemned the attacks, saying the “evil-doers” targeted innocent civilians. White House National Security Council spokesman Ned Price also condemned the attack. In a statement, Price accused al-Shabaab of attempting “to weaken Somalia ahead of its historic political transition this autumn.”

Somalia is preparing for parliamentary elections next month and a presidential election in October. The upcoming elections mark the first electoral process in the country since the United States recognized the Federal Republic of Somalia in 2013, said Joshua Meservey, a policy analyst with the Heritage Foundation. But al-Shabaab poses a threat to that process.

“The terror group al-Shabaab still controls chunks of the country and is determined to play spoiler in its effort to delegitimize the Somali government,” Meservey said.