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| Plane crashes in Somali capital | Plane crashes in Somali capital |
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| A plane has crashed shortly after taking off from an airport in the Somali capital, Mogadishu. | A plane has crashed shortly after taking off from an airport in the Somali capital, Mogadishu. |
| Local witnesses said they saw columns of smoke on the ground. The cause of the crash and the type of aircraft were not immediately known. | Local witnesses said they saw columns of smoke on the ground. The cause of the crash and the type of aircraft were not immediately known. |
| One reporter said he saw a missile hit the plane but this is not confirmed. | One reporter said he saw a missile hit the plane but this is not confirmed. |
| It crashed in the city's northern suburbs, where there has not been any fighting on Friday, but some shooting was heard in southern Mogadishu. | |
| "I saw the plane on fire... One of the wings exploded in the air... When it hit the ground, another explosion occurred," local resident Hassan Mahamud Jama told Reuters news agency. | "I saw the plane on fire... One of the wings exploded in the air... When it hit the ground, another explosion occurred," local resident Hassan Mahamud Jama told Reuters news agency. |
| Some reports said the plane crashed because of a mechanical failure. | |
| Capt Paddy Ankunda, spokesman for Uganda's peacekeepers in Somalia, said he was aware of reports of a plane crash but was unable to confirm this. | |
| Mogadishu's international airport is located in the heart of the city. | |
| 'Large explosions' | |
| Earlier, clan elders from the Hawiye clan which dominates Mogadishu said they had agreed a truce with the Ethiopian army, which helped install the government in they city last December. | |
| However, some shooting continued. | |
| One local resident said he had heard a number of large explosions and machine gunfire. | |
| A government official, who did not want to be identified, told the BBC he had heard that Ethiopian tanks had been firing on buildings occupied by Islamist insurgents. | |
| More than 20 people have died in clashes between insurgents and Ethiopia-backed government forces during two days of clashes - the heaviest fighting in the city this year. | |
| Earlier this month, some 1,200 Ugandan peacekeepers arrived in the city to replace the Ethiopians who want to pull out. | |
| Somalia has not had an effective national government since 1991. |