The pro-government forces resumed Saturday Somali control of a border town with Kenya as part of a major offensive against insurgents Shebab has caused many deaths in the ranks of the African Union force in Mogadishu .
Saturday morning, a coalition of allied forces in TFG troops chased the insurgent town of Bulo Hawo, located on the border with Kenya and Ethiopia, according to several sources.
"We have total control" of the city, told the press Khalif Abdi Mohamed, head of the local district.
Shebab a commander, speaking on condition of anonymity, confirmed the withdrawal of insurgent fighters in the city Saturday, but added that it was a strategic withdrawal.
"We will resume Bulo Hawo.Shebab troops who have withdrawn for military reasons are not far away, "he said.
The Shebab, who profess allegiance to Al Qaeda, control most of southern and central Somalia and vowed the loss of the Transitional Federal Government (TFG) backed by the international community.
The pro-government troops who retook the city are made up of militiamen led by local warlord Barre Shire Hirale and members of the armed group Jamaa wal Sunnah Sufi Ahlu, supported, according to several security sources interviewed by AFP, by elements of the Ethiopian army who carried out artillery fire during the fighting.
Bulo Hawo, which adjoins the Kenyan town of Mandera, had already been taken to Shebab in October 2010 before being abandoned a few weeks later by pro-government forces on substantive disagreements with the TFG.
The recent fighting in Bulo Hawo were triggered at the same time as the offensive by government forces and African Union force (AMISOM) in Mogadishu from 19 February.
The simultaneous opening of these fronts - a third was opened in Beledweyne (center-west) - is it seems to stretch the lines Shebab and prevent them from concentrating all their troops in Mogadishu.
After controlling a network of trenches and tunnels in Mogadishu, used by insurgents for their supply and infiltration operations, the TFG forces and the Burundian contingent of AMISOM had delivered Feb. 23 to resume a bloody battle strategic positions in the north of the city.
According to military sources corroborating Amisom recorded in this offensive the biggest losses since its deployment in March 2007, well beyond the eight deaths officially accepted by the force.
"The official date given is completely false.In fact, 43 soldiers of the Burundian contingent of AMISOM were killed, four others were missing and 110 were wounded during the latest offensive joint Somali government in Mogadishu-Amisom, "he told AFP a military source Mogadishu, who requested anonymity, contacted by telephone.
A senior Amisom and the commander of the force refused Saturday to Nairobi to reveal the exact number of casualties in their ranks, preferring to emphasize the importance of the positions listed the insurgents, including the building of the former Ministry of Defence, which dominates the north of the capital, and the former dairy plant.
"The positions we have conquered the past two weeks break the grip of militant extremists in Mogadishu," has provided to the press Wafula Wamunyinyi, deputy representative for Somalia of the Committee of the African Union.
