Mortars kill 15 more in Mogadishu as 50 NGOs appeal

MOGADISHU (Reuters) - Mortar attacks in Somalia's capital killed 15 more people on Monday and 50 aid agencies appealed against "horrendous" violence as Islamist insurgents battle the government and its Ethiopian military backers.

Residents in Mogadishu said insurgents fired artillery rounds at the presidential palace from the city's Bakara Market, prompting guards at the hilltop compound to return fire.

Witnesses said three soldiers were killed at the palace, while a dozen civilians died in the streets below.

Abdinasir Said, a Bakara shopkeeper, said he saw six people blown to pieces by a mortar bomb that detonated in the market.

"We have been carrying the injured ones to safety after the shelling stopped," he told Reuters by telephone.

Another man was killed in the market. Nearby, residents said a woman, her three children and a family friend were killed when another mortar bomb crashed onto their home.

The barrages were just the latest example of violence in the Somali capital that has displaced some 37,000 people in recent weeks, swelling an internal refugee population of 1.1 million, non-governmental organisations (NGOs) said on Monday.

More than 50 NGOs issued a statement expressing concern about the "devastating humanitarian crisis" and "horrendous" violence in the country.

Also on Monday, a roadside bomb hit a U.N. car in Merka, Lower Shabelle region, killing its Somali driver and wounding an Italian U.N. employee, a U.N. security source said.

Aid workers say the world is shrugging its shoulders at yet more suffering in Somalia, which has been mired in civil conflict since the 1991 fall of a dictator.

"Nearly half of Somalia's population, or 3.25 million people, are now in need of emergency aid. This is a 77 percent increase since the beginning of 2008," the NGOs said.

"HORRENDOUS IMPACT"

"This number has increased dramatically over the past year due to the destructive combination of extreme insecurity, drought and record-high food prices. The situation is expected to deteriorate further with ordinary Somalis bearing the brunt."

U.N.-led efforts to broker peace have not brought any lessening of violence "that continues to have a horrendous impact on civilians," they said.

"In the last few weeks, renewed shelling in Mogadishu has displaced approximately 37,000 civilians from their homes. Over the past nine months, 870,000 have fled for their lives. A total of 1.1 million people are currently displaced in Somalia today."

The NGOs criticised all parties in the Somali conflict for indiscriminate and disproportionate use of force. They noted that attacks on aid workers were hurting humanitarian efforts.

"This year alone 24 aid workers, of which 20 are Somali nationals, have been killed whilst carrying out their work. The whereabouts of another ten are unknown. There have been 111 reported security incidents directly targeting aid agencies."

(Additional reporting by Ibrahim Mohamed in Mogadishu and Andrew Cawthorne in Nairobi; Writing by Daniel Wallis; Editing by Giles Elgood)