Debris from explosions carried out in northern Somalia in the breakaway region known as Puntland.
Originally uploaded by Pan-African News Wire File Photos
Thursday, October 30
MOGADISHU (AFP) - - At least 25 people in addition to the bombers were killed in five suicide car bomb attacks on Wednesday in two northern Somali breakaway states, officials said.
Three suicide car bombs struck the presidential palace, the United Nations Development Programme's compound and Ethiopia's diplomatic representation in Hargeysa, the capital of Somaliland.
"We have counted about 19 people, including the secretary of the palace, who were killed in the attacks," a Somaliland police official told AFP.
A local medical official spoke to at least 24 wounded admitted in hospitals after the blasts.
An Ethiopian foreign ministry spokesman told AFP in Addis Ababa that four Ethiopians were among the victims in the bombings of their representation.
"So far, we know that this terrorist attack has claimed at least four lives, Ethiopian staff," Wahide Belay said, adding that at least another person was wounded.
"But this toll can go up as there were people in the premises who were waiting for visas or other services," he said.
Two other simultaneous suicide car bombs struck two separate buildings housing anti-terrorism centres run by the Puntland Intelligence Service (PIS) in the port city of Bosasso.
The president of Puntland, Mohamoud Musa Hirsi Adde, said six members of the PIS were killed in the twin blasts.
"Six members of the Puntland Intelligence Service were killed by the attack in Bosasso," the president, who was in the economic capital of the semi-autonomous region, told reporters.
The overall death for the coordinated attacks stood at 30, including the five bombers.
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