At least 140 people were killed in two days of fighting in the Somali capital that ended after one of the city's last holdout warlords surrendered to Islamist militias, a hospital official said today.
Somali Islamic fighters sit outside Villa Baidoa as Mogadishu's last secular warlord surrenders. Reuters/Shabele Media
The senior administrator at Mogadishu's Madina hospital said casualties from the two days of fighting, which started on Sunday and ended late last night when militia loyal to warlord Abdi Awale Qaybdiid began surrendering,
He said the toll would probably rise as many had not yet been taken to hospital.
The fighting pitted Islamist militias who control most of Mogadishu against gunmen backing Qaybdiid, a member of a routed alliance of US-backed warlords, and those of Hussein Aideed, a warlord and deputy prime minister in the interim government.