Two police killed in Mogadishu blast

Two Somali police officers were killed on Tuesday when a roadside bomb blast hit a government vehicle in southern Mogadishu, witnesses said.

The vehicle, which belonged to the Central Bank of Somalia, was targeted on a heavily-patroled road linking the centre of Somalia's capital to the airport and other areas to the south.

"I heard a boom and suddenly I saw smoke. The car had been hit by the blast," eyewitness Amr Hashi told AFP. "Police fired shots in the air and sealed off the area."

Ismail Abdisalam Mohamed, another witness, said: "The vehicle was partially destroyed because the explosion caught the back of the vehicle, where the security guards were sitting."

Mogadishu has been rocked by almost daily attacks carried out by Islamist insurgents and allied warlords battling Ethiopian-backed Somali government forces.