Blast near Somali PM's car kills 3

MOGADISHU - An explosion tore through a convoy of cars carrying Somalia's Prime Minister Mohamed Ali Gedi in Mogadishu on Sunday killing three but leaving him unhurt, residents said.

Government aides said a landmine caused an explosion that sharply raised tensions in a city controlled largely by Gedi's political foes. One witness said the convoy appeared to have been targeted deliberately.

The blast set ablaze at least one vehicle among several that were ferrying and one of his deputies from an airstrip to the lawless Indian Ocean city.

Gedi had flown in from his headquarters north of the capital to try to hold talks with a dissident faction of ministers based in Mogadishu to end a rift in the government stirring fears of renewed civil war.

About 20 people were hurt in the blast, the medical sources said. One unconfirmed report from residents said one of Gedi's bodyguards was among the dead.

"It struck the car directly behind the prime minister's car, and that vehicle burst into flames," Ali Nur Sahal, an aide to Deputy Prime Minister Hussein Aideed, told Reuters.

"We believe it was a landmine."

Aideed, also Interior Minister, had welcomed Gedi at the airstrip and was also in the convoy. He too was unhurt.

Gedi, based in the town of Jowhar 90 km north of Mogadishu, was visiting for only the second time since he was appointed as part of a Transitional Federal Government (TFG) formed at peace talks in Kenya in 2004.

The TFG is the 14th attempt to reinstate central government since the 1991 toppling of former dictator Mohamed Siad Barre. But the administration has found it difficult to impose any authority on the warlords who still control much of the country.

Most of the government's ministers work from Jowhar, arguing that the capital is too dangerous. But a dissident faction is based in Mogadishu, as is Aideed, who has tried to steer a neutral course between the two groupings.

Experts say both factions of the government are gearing up for a military showdown, and a UN report by a panel of experts said government ministers on both sides had bought large amounts of weapons in recent months in breach of a UN arms embargo.

On Gedi's first visit to Mogadishu in May, 14 people were killed and about 60 wounded in an explosion at a stadium where he was addressing a crowd. Again, he was unhurt. The cause of that blast has not been established.

One witness to Sunday's blast, who declined to be identified, said: "People in the area say this was an organised explosion. Cars have been passing safely along this road all day (without incident)."

Gunmen guarding the convoy showered the street with automatic fire moments after the blast, which went off a few hundred metres from his destination, the Ramadan Hotel. Militia allied to Gedi later cordoned off the area.

Gedi later spoke on radio and said he was in Mogadishu to meet fellow cabinet ministers. He did not mention the blast.

- REUTERS