Somali General Mohamed Ibrahim Farah and four other soldiers were killed on Sunday, according to officials with the self-proclaimed Somali government, when they were ambushed by al-Shabab militants near Merca.
A town in southern Somalia, which has been mostly conquered by Kenyan troops in their recent invasion, Merca has recently fallen back under al-Shabab’s control, to the extent that any Somali cities can be said to be “under control” of any faction.
Al-Shabab hasn’t commented on the death of the general, the first time anyone with such a high rank in the makeshift Somali Army has been slain in an attack. This is unusual as normally the group would eagerly claim credit for an attack.
The Somali “government” got its start as a group of expatriots who declared themselves the new regime while meeting on a soccer field in Kenya. The group began to try to rule Somalia, with heavy backing from the UN, after they were kicked out of their Kenya hotel for non-payment