29 killed as Islamists clash in Somalia

MOGADISHU, Somalia - Clashes between Islamist militias have killed at least 29 people and wounded more than 50 others in central Somalia, witnesses said yesterday. It was the latest sign of divisions within an Islamist insurgency the US government says has links to Al Qaeda.

The fighting in the town of Guriel between the hardline al-Shabab militia and a local Islamist militia coincides with the gradual evacuation of Ethiopian forces loyal to Somalia's tottering UN-backed government. Somali officials have warned that a power vacuum would spark intensified fighting.

Al-Shabab lost control of Guriel, 230 miles north of the capital, last month and a local militia commander said they had failed to retake it.

"We killed dozens of the attackers, including their commander, we have also seized most of their weapons that they abandoned in fear," said Sheik Abdullahi Abu Yusuf, spokesman for the Islamist group Ahlu-sunah Wal-jamea.

The US State Department says al-Shabab is linked to Al Qaeda and harbors fugitives who planned twin bombings of American embassies in Kenya and Tanzania 10 years ago that killed hundreds of people.

Al-Shabab promotes a strict version of Islamic law and has stoned to death a 13-year-old girl for adultery even though her parents said she was a rape victim. Yusuf's group promotes Islam but says it is opposed to some of al-Shabab's actions.

There have been several clashes between Islamist groups in Somalia in recent weeks. On Saturday, residents reported fighting between al-Shabab and another Islamist faction in the town of Balad, 19 miles north of the capital, but no casualties.

ASSOCIATED PRESS