21 dead amid fierce fighting in Somalia

NAIROBI (Reuters/AFP) - Al Shabaab rebels seized back a town in southern Somalia from pro-government militiamen on Thursday after fighting that killed at least 21 people, witnesses said.
Western security agencies say Somalia, which has been torn by civil war for the past 18 years, has become a haven for militants plotting attacks in the Horn of Africa and beyond.
Earlier this week, militiamen supporting President Sheikh Sharif Ahmeds fragile administration chased al Shabaab fighters out of the southern town of Bulahawa without firing at shot.
On Thursday, al Shabaab returned with reinforcements.
An al Shabaab spokesman in Bulahawa, Sheikh Osman, told Reuters the group had retaken control.
We have defeated the Ethiopian-backed militia, he said.
Meanwhile another rebel group, Hizbul Islam, retook control of Luuq town, which is also in Gedo region. They had abandoned it on Wednesday to a pro-government militia. [ID:nLJ085215]
Residents said there was no fighting in Luuq.
Meanwhile, 21 people died Thursday as the battle for southern and central Somalia intensified when Ethiopian-backed pro-government forces thrust into areas held by extremist Shebab fighters.
Forces from the transitional federal government supported by militias from the Sufi group Ahlu Sunna wal Jamaa attacked the town of Bulobarde in central Somalia, sparking fierce clashes, witnesses and commanders said.
Meanwhile, Shebab fighters retaliated by attacking their rear in the key town of Beledweyn, near the Ethiopian border, they said.
Bulobarde is located some 200 kilometres north of the capital Mogadishu and is the main town on the road linking the capital Mogadishu to Beledweyn.
According to locals and military commanders, at least 21 people, mainly combatants, were killed during the first hours of fighting in Bulobarde.
Residents said the fighting was the heaviest the town had seen in a long time and that both sides used heavy machine-guns and anti-aircraft weapons.
The fighting has stopped for now but the warring sides are still facing off in one neighbourhood... I personally saw the bodies of 18 fighters and the death toll could be much higher, local resident Abdurahman Ali said.
Abdikarim Muktar, a grocer, said the heaviest fighting occurred near a bridge over a river dividing the town.
Most of the people died near the bridge where the fighting was fierce. The government forces were pushed back from that area, he said.
But as Shebab forces attempted to hold off the pro-government offensive in Bulobarde, they also moved to recapture Beledweyn, witnesses said.
Shebab forces launced an attack from a neighbouring region and entered the town, said Abdullahi Moalim Hassan, an elder in Beledweyn.
There was intense exchange and they took control of the western part of the town. Eight people have been injured, most of them civilians.
An alliance of clan militias, government forces and Ahlu Sunna wal Jamaa fighters earlier this week recaptured two strategic southwestern towns from the Shebab without any fighting.
According to residents, the Islamist insurgents however on Wednesday wrested back control of the town of Bulohawo, which sits just across the border from the Kenyan town of Mandera.
Ahlu Sunna wal Jamaa and allied groups have recently inflicted serious losses on the Shebab, who had controlled much of central and southern Somalia in recent months.
Earlier this week, the prime minister of Somalias embattled interim administration reshuffled the cabinet to offer a tougher response to a bruising insurgency.
The Shebab and the more political Hezb al-Islam on May 7 launched a broad military offensive in Mogadishu and other regions, leaving President Sharif Sheikh Ahmeds power hanging by thread.
Tuesdays reshuffle saw a new defence minister brought in and a powerful deputy appointed to bolster the governments war effort.
According to residents and fighters, some of the pro-government groups involved in the latest counter-offensive to weaken the Shebab have received training in Ethiopia.
Ethiopian government spokesman Bereket Simon made no secret of the fact that his regime was propping the new war effort against the Shebab, an Al Qaeda-inspired organisation listed as a terrorist group by Washington.
We have openly told the world that we will support the (transitional government). We have been training their forces and will continue to do so because they are forces of peace, he told reporters in Addis Ababa.
In January, Ethiopia ended an ill-fated two-year invasion of Somalia which had been aimed at uprooting Islamic extremists and consolidating the internationally recognised transitional government.