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MOGADISHU (Reuters) - At least 12 people were killed in fighting on Friday between Islamist insurgents and African Union peacekeepers in Somalia's capital and the government again called for more foreign troops to help battle the rebels.

Rebels from the al Shabaab group, which Washington says is al Qaeda's proxy in the failed Horn of Africa state, said they attacked government bases and AMISOM peacekeeping troops overnight and were then hit by shellfire themselves.

"This fighting was the worst in months," Mogadishu resident Ahmed Hashi told Reuters.

Violence in Somalia has killed 19,000 civilians since the start of 2007 and uprooted a further 1.5 million people, a contributing cause of one of the world's worst humanitarian emergencies.

It is exactly a year since President Sheikh Sharif Ahmed was elected by parliament and once again showed that the beleaguered Somali administration effectively depends on 5,000 African peacekeepers to survive.

At an AU summit in the Ethiopian capital Addis Ababa, Somali Foreign Minister Ali Jama' Jangeli called for more African Union troops to help soldiers from Uganda and Burundi in the capital.

His Kenyan and Sudanese counterparts backed the call. Djibouti said this week it would send 450 soldiers soon.

"The situation in Somalia is very grim, it is very precarious. It is threatening stability in the whole of the east Africa region and the Horn of Africa," Sudanese Foreign Minister Deng Alor told Reuters in Addis Ababa.