Somali rebel group al-Shabab said it has killed 43 soldiers in an attack on a base of Ethiopian troops serving with the African Union's AMISOM force in the Horn of Africa nation.
"Our fighters stormed the Halgan base of AMISOM ... We killed 43 AU soldiers from Ethiopia in the fighting," al-Shabab's military operations spokesperson Sheikh Abdiasis Abu Musab told Reuters news agency after Thursday's attack, adding "several" of its fighters had also been killed without giving a figure.
"It was a huge blast. It destroyed the gate and parts of the base," he added.
The base at Halgan town lies in the Hiran region of central Soma
lia about 300km north of the capital Mogadishu.
Residents said they heard a huge explosion at the base and a heavy exchange of gunfire shortly before dawn.
"Al-Shabab says they drove a car equipped with a suicide bomb into the base followed by armed men storming the base, killing the soldiers,” said Mohamed Adow, reporting from Kenyan capital of Nairobi.
An AMISOM spokesman said that there was "an attempted attack" at a base in Halgan, adding that their forces were still in charge of the base, according to Adow. Read more at Aljazeera here
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