At a ceremony at Somalia’s national theater on Wednesday, an explosion killed at least 10 people, including two Olympic sports officials in an attack by an Islamist group at a site that symbolized the city’s attempt to rise from two decades of war. The blast occurred at the newly reopened theater as the Somali Prime Minister Abdiweli Mohamed Ali was standing at the podium to deliver a speech. Government spokesman Abdirahman Omar Osman reported that the prime minister was unharmed. The president of Somalia’s Olympic committee and the president of its soccer federation were killed, the federation’s secretary Shafici Mohyadin said.
The explosion ruined a cautious peace that descended on Somalia’s capital, Mogadishu, after fighters belonging to the Islamist group al-Shabab were forced out last August by government and African Union troops. The government reported that the attack was carried out by a female suicide bomber, but al-Shabab, which used its official Twitter feed to take responsibility for the attack, said explosives were planted in the theater before the event took place. Osman said, “It was a cowardly act and that will not deter the government from performing its national duties. The prime minister will energize the government to eliminate the terrorists out of the country.” The International Olympic Committee issued a statement saying it was “shocked to hear of the terrorist attack that took the lives of the President of the Somali Olympic Committee Aden Yabarow Wiish and Somali Football Federation chief Said Mohamed Nur today in Mogadishu” and they have lost two great leaders.
