Two bombing attacks have killed seven people in the southern and central parts of Somalia.

Officials in police and military forces said on Sunday that the two attacks had occurred in the past 24 hours.

In the first incident, two bombs planted in front of the house of a military official in Wanlaweyn Town, 90 kilometers northwest of the capital, Mogadishu, went off late on Saturday, killing four people, including soldiers and civilians.

“First we heard a blast at the house. The military officer was absent by then. Guards and residents came to find out what caused the blast, and then a second blast went off,” Mohamed Nur, an officer from the Wanlaweyn police, told Reuters on Sunday.

In the second incident, three militants blew up their car at a security checkpoint in Bacadweyn Town in central Somalia’s Galmudug State on Sunday.

Three soldiers died and two others were wounded in the attack, according to Major Abdullahi Ahmed, a military officer in the nearby town of Galkayo.

The usual suspect in such attacks is the al-Qaeda-linked al-Shabab militant group.

The Takfiri outfit was driven out of Mogadishu with the help of international African Union forces in 2011.
Al-Shabaab bomb attack kills governor in Somalia
Al-Shabaab bomb attack kills governor in Somalia
A governor in Somalia’s Puntland is killed in a bomb attack by militants from the Takfiri al-Shabab group.

Since then, its power has diminished in most of its former main strongholds.

However, the group still wields significant influence in the vast swathes of the countryside, from where it recruits, coordinates, and launches attacks against government, military, and civilian targets in Somalia and neighboring countries.