DPA
Tuesday, September 18, 2007
The soldiers cordoned off the area mid-morning and attempted to force their way into the facility, whose doors were locked by the journalists.
'When the fire began, the journalists scattered. Everybody ran to escape the bullets,' said Jafar Kukay, Shabelle radio station's acting director, who was reached by phone.
He said some equipment was damaged but he didn't know of any casualties.
Shabelle, among other agencies in Somalia, has been critical of both the government and militias in its reporting of a nine-month long Iraq-style insurgency in the capital Mogadishu.
'Soldiers are targeting us because we report the facts. We only talk about the facts and we don't give sympathy to a particular group,' said Kukay.
Radio stations have been shut down, journalists arrested and killed since the government swept into Mogadishu in January, ousting a popular Islamist group.
Mogadishu has not known peace since the 1991 toppling of dictator Mohammed Siad Barre, which plunged the Horn of Africa country into anarchy.
The government of President Abdullahi Yusuf is the international community's 14th attempt at cementing effective central rule in Somalia.
Source: dpa, Sept 18, 2007