The festivities broke out at dawn when heavily armed fighters from the Islamist movement Al-Shabaab
... Somalia's version of the Taliban, functioning as an arm of al-Qaeda...
launched an attack on soldiers stationed on one of the war-battered city's frontlines in the Hosh neighbourhood.
Similarly, an attack took place at a government compound in Yaqshid district, north of Mogadishu, sparking a battle between Somali forces and their opposing Al shabab thugs.