By Xinhua
Nairobi : The United Nations has suspended its operations in Somalia following attacks on its compound in the country’s capital Mogadishu.
The UN said in a release Monday that although there were no casualties in last Friday’s attacks, it was forced to suspend operations in Mogadishu as well as the major towns of Afgooye and Kismayo for the week.
A number of international non-governmental organizations have also temporarily suspended staff travel to the countryside, where similar attacks have taken place in the past week, according to the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs.
The source said the attackers struck the UN Development Programme offices several times overnight after ordering residents in the area to switch off their lights late Friday.
The new constraints compound other obstacles to aid deliveries, including roadblocks, shelling and violence as well as rising threats against aid workers, who are at times directly targeted in Somalia.
The interim government and its Ethiopian military allies are facing a persistent insurgency in Mogadishu by remnants of a hardline Islamist movement they routed over a year ago.
The worsening security situation has led to a mass exodus from Mogadishu. Over the past two months, some 40,000 people have fled the Somali capital.
The UN refugee agency puts the total number of those displaced by the ongoing fighting since the end of last October at over 294,000.