3 March 2008
Washington, DC — The United States bombed a town in southern Somalia on Monday in a strike on suspected terrorists, United States defense officials told news agencies. Six people are reported dead.
Three missiles struck a building in Dobley, a town four miles from the border with Kenya, the Associated Press reported. Remnants of Somalia's Union of Islamic Courts, an organization that ruled much of the southern part of the country until late 2006, reportedly took the town last week. The British Broadcasting Corporation is reporting that the missile strike killed six and wounded 20.
Pentagon spokesperson Bryan Whitman told journalists that the attack targeted a "known al-Qaida terrorist."
Earlier, in the day, a U.S. military official told the AP in Washington, "It was a deliberate, precise strike against a known terrorist and his associates." Reuters reported that a U.S. defense official said that the strike targeted a building that is known to be frequently used by terrorists.
A witness told the AP that three planes were involved in the attack. "We woke up with a loud and big bang and when we came out we found our neighbor's house completely obliterated as if no house existed here," Fatuma Abdullahi said.
Reuters spoke with a man in Kismayu, 140 miles north of Dobley, who said the building destroyed in the attack belonged to him. He claimed his daughter had been wounded in the attack.
"We do not know whether the missiles were fired by the American AC-130 plane which is still flying over the city. All we know they dropped from the sky," Mohamed Nurie Salad said. He was planning on returning to Dobley to assess the damage.
In January 2007, the U.S. launched two airstrikes targeting suspected terrorists in the area around Dobley.
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