Deadly Shooting Leaves Four Al-Shabaab Inmates Dead in Mogadishu Central Prison

Deadly shooting between security officers and Al-Shabaab inmates ensued at the heavily fortified Mogadishu Central Prison, a senior official confirmed, in an unprecedented incident which left four inmates dead and a number of fatalities among the security forces.

Ismail Muktar, the Somali government spokesperson, said four armed Al-Shabaab convicts tried to escape from the prison, leading to a heavy gunfight with security officers; they were killed on the spot after a swift response from the officers manning the facility, which holds most of the country's convicted Al-Shabaab prisoners. He said there were casualties among the guards but the number could not be established at the time. "A commotion ensued after armed Al-Shabaab militants tried to escape from a legal holding facility," Muktar said. "Security officers engaged them in a fierce gunfight and killed them within the perimeter of the prison. The officers have since taken charge of the facility. We of course have casualties on the government side but we shall give details later. It's a very unprecedented incident and we're really trying to establish what transpired."

Mogadishu Central Prison holds the country's most dangerous inmates, mostly convicted Al-Shabaab militants serving life or death sentences handed down by the military court. Multiple sources said the incident began after an inmate grabbed a gun from a guard inside the facility and began shooting indiscriminately, mainly at the security officers on duty. A police officer who spoke to OPR in confidence said the officer who lost the gun was shot dead on the spot as the inmate tried to escape; minutes later, another exchange of fire started inside the facility as officers tried to contain the situation.

An inmate reported to be on the run was said to have killed a tuk-tuk driver outside the prison and fled in the vehicle. The gunfight began in the afternoon and continued into the evening, when security forces ended the standoff by shooting dead all the armed prisoners involved. The prison, located beside a cement factory in Mogadishu, is guarded by elite officers because of the nature of the inmates held there. In recent weeks, many Al-Shabaab convicts had been locked up in the facility after hasty trials by the military courts.

Besides Mogadishu Central Prison, hardcore criminals, especially those from Al-Shabaab, are detained in cells run by the National Intelligence and Security Agency (NISA), then led by Fahad Yasin, a former Al Jazeera journalist and a controversial figure in the country's politics. The attack came barely a day after Al-Shabaab militants attacked an army base within Mogadishu, leaving eight Somali National Army officers dead — the second successful raid on an army camp that year, after the February attack on the El-Salini base.

Security has since been reinforced within the capital and around the prison. The attack raises questions about Somalia's state of preparedness ahead of the planned 2021 exit of African Union troops under the Somali Transition Plan.

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The Organization for Prisoners' Rights is an independent, non-profit civil society organization based in Mogadishu, Somalia, documenting conditions of detention, arbitrary detention, and human rights violations in Somali prisons and detention facilities since 2019.

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