Somalia PM vowed responsibility for deadly hotel siege

Somalia’s prime minister vowed the government would be held accountable for the deadly Mogadishu hotel siege by al-Shabaab jihadists, which he branded “children of hell”.

Hamza Abdi Barre also called on Somalis to unite against the al-Qaeda-linked group, which has been waging a bloody insurgency in the impoverished Horn of Africa nation for more than 15 years.

“There will be accountability in government … anyone who has neglected the responsibilities entrusted to them will be held accountable,” Barre told reporters late Sunday.

He was speaking after visiting a hospital treating victims of the Hayat Hotel bombing and gun attack that killed 21 and wounded 117, according to the Health Ministry.

The 30-hour siege was the deadliest attack in Mogadishu since the election of President Hassan Sheikh Mohamud in May following a protracted political crisis.

Al-Shabaab commandos stormed the hotel on Friday night, with the siege only ending around midnight on Saturday after security forces bombed the building, leaving much of it in ruins.

Police said more than 100 people, including women and children, were rescued.

“Here there are only one of two options: either we let Al-Shabaab – the children of hell – live, or we live. We can’t live together,” said Barre, who was appointed prime minister in June.

“I call on the Somali people to unite to fight the enemy… so that what they have done now will never happen again.”

“The fight against them has already started in several places,” he said without elaborating.

The Hayat was a popular meeting place for government officials and a large crowd was inside when a suicide bomber triggered a massive explosion, opening a path into the compound for heavily armed gunmen.

Minutes later, a second explosion struck as rescuers, security forces and civilians rushed to help the injured, witnesses said.

As late as Monday, security officers were still combing the rubble looking for explosives and possibly buried bodies.

The building remained cordoned off, but nearby roads have reopened and traffic in Mogadishu has returned to normal.

“The only difference between this attack and previous ones is the length of the siege and how long it took security forces to contain the situation,” said Samira Gaid, executive director of Mogadishu-based think tank Hiraal Institute.

She said the change in Somalia’s leadership may have influenced the security forces’ response. “There was the fact that security guards and security chiefs are expected to be changed when a new government comes into power.”

Since Mohamud took office, al-Shabaab has carried out several attacks in the predominantly Muslim country. Last month it also made an incursion into neighboring Ethiopia, raiding a military base on the border.

Former al-Shabaab commander Mukhtar Robow, who is now religion minister in Barre’s cabinet, condemned the attack and urged fighters to leave the extremist group.

“I call on them to repent… I tell them, ‘You know this is not right, so repent and leave (al-Shabaab) and God willing, you will survive,'” he said.

Somalia’s allies, including the United States, Britain, the European Union and Turkey, as well as the UN, strongly condemned the attack, as did ATMIS, the African Union force tasked with helping Somali forces shoulder primary responsibility for the Security to take over by the end of 2020 2024.

Earlier this month, Washington said its forces had killed 13 al-Shabaab operatives in an airstrike, the most recent attack since President Joe Biden ordered the restoration of a U.S. troop presence in Somalia in May, reversing a decision by Donald Trump.

The Islamist militants, who advocate a strict version of Sharia, or Islamic law, were driven out of Mogadishu by an African Union (AU) force in 2011.

But they still control tracts of land and retain the ability to unleash deadly strikes, often hitting hotels and restaurants, as well as military and political targets.

The deadliest attack occurred in October 2017 when a truck loaded with explosives blew up in Mogadishu, killing 512 people.

The Hayat attack was reminiscent of deadly sieges in neighboring Kenya, a contributor to AU forces.

Al-Shabaab claimed responsibility for a four-day siege of a shopping mall in Nairobi in September 2013 that killed 67 people, and an hour-long attack on an upscale hotel complex there in 2019 that killed 21 people.