MOGADISHU 2 Sep (ANA) - A suicide bomber has attacked a government office in the Somali capital, Mogadishu, causing a nearby school to collapse, police say.

 

The car bomb in Howlwadag district killed three soldiers and injured 14 people, including six children, local officials told BBC Somali.

 

The blast also damaged nearby houses and blew the roof off a mosque.

 

The militant group al-Shabab, which has waged an insurgency for more than 10 years, said it carried out the attack.

 

The three soldiers had died as they stopped the explosives-laden car from entering a government compound, local official Salah Hassan Omar said.

 

Raqiya Mahamed Ali, who was in the compound at the time, said: "We were in the middle of our usual work when the explosion happened.

 

"I hid under the table. There was a lot of gunfire at our gate... when I came out, I saw many people injured on the ground and others dead," she told Reuters.

 

Somalia has faced instability and violence since 1991, when the military government was overthrown.(ANA)

FA/ANA/2 September 2018-------