Somali minister killed by car bomb

June 18, 2009

According to officials, the Somali security minister, Omar Hashi Aden, was killed after a suicide car bomb detonated near a hotel in Beledweyne, located north of the Somalia's capital of Mogadishu.

At least nine other people are believed to have been killed in the explosion. Among the dead was Abdulkarim Ibrahim Lakanyo, a former ambassador to Ethiopia.

The country's president, Sheikh Sharif Sheikh Ahmed, blamed the attacks on the radical Islamist al-Shabaab militant group, which is believed to have links with al-Qaeda. Al-Shabaab later did claim responsibility for the incident.

"I am sending condolences to the family of the Security Minister Omar Hashi who was killed in an explosion in Baladwayne," Ahmed said.