Mogadishu,(insidesomalia.org)- A firefight between Islamic insurgents and Somali police at a checkpoint outside the capital has left five people dead, witnesses said Thursday.

Four officers and one civilian were killed in the gunbattle that started late Wednesday when insurgents raided the police checkpoint. The insurgents used machine-guns, rocket-propelled grenades and assault rifles in the surprise attack, said Asho Nur, who sells tea at the site.

A spokesman for the military wing of a radical Islamic movement, Abdirahin Isse Adow, said the aim of the raid was "to cripple both the military and the economic sources of the enemy."

Thousands of Somalis have been killed in fighting between Islamic insurgents and Ethiopian troops supporting Somalia's shaky government over the past 12 months.

The Islamists vowed to fight after the Ethiopians dislodged them from power in December 2006. They had held the capital and much of southern Somalia for six months before they were pushed out.

Somalia has not had a functioning government since 1991, when warlords overthrew dictator Mohamed Siad Barre and then turned on one another. A web of clan loyalties and the involvement of archenemies Eritrea and Ethiopia further complicates the conflict in the impoverished country.

Source: AP

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