AFP/Mogadishu

Around 11 people were killed in Somalia’s capital yesterday when a suicide attacker from the Al-Qaeda-linked Shebaab insurgents rammed a car laden with explosives into a convoy carrying officials from Qatar, police said.

“Several people have been killed, the blast was big ... the number of those killed is around 11,” police official Mohamed Adan said.

Four officials visiting from Qatar were travelling in armoured vehicles belonging to the interior ministry when the convoy was attacked, but were unharmed.

“The convoy was escorting a delegation from Qatar, the police escorted them to a safe area after they survived the attack,” Gen Garad Nur, a senior police commander, told reporters.

The blast is the latest in a string of bloody attacks in the seaside capital, where Al-Qaeda-linked Shebaab insurgents have vowed to topple the government and have set off several bombs and launched guerrilla-style strikes.

“The mujahedeen have today carried out the first of a series of attacks,” the Shebaab said in a message on Twitter.

The car exploded close to a police station at the central K4 roundabout, a busy part of Mogadishu where many people gather to drink tea at roadside stalls.

“I saw eight bodies including a woman, some of them were burned very badly by the fire from the explosion,” said eyewitness Ali Yusuf. “It was a terrible sight.”

An AFP reporter on the scene said that the armoured car hit in the attack had been damaged with its back windows blasted out.

Body parts were strewn around the blast site, where fire trucks sprayed water on the smouldering wreckage of the vehicles while several wounded were taken to hospital.

A second bomb hidden by the roadside and remotely detonated was set off around the same time in the Daynille district of Mogadishu targeting passing security forces, but injured no one, police added.

The attacks come just ahead of a conference in London tomorrow to draw up plans to boost security and increase development in conflict-torn Somalia.