Mogadishu December 17, 2022 (SD) – The Somali military spokesman said that the Al-Shabaab group has started kidnapping local residents.

Brigadier General Abdullahi Ali Anood said the group is angered that the families whose children they’ve enlisted took up weapons and fought alongside government forces.

The Spokesperson added that it has so far taken over 70 regions from Al-Shabaab, including its biggest base in Aden Yabal district in the Middle Shabelle region.

The government said that most of the liberated region’s residents were either abducted or displaced by the militants.

In other news, Somali forces with the help of the local Ma’awisley militias carried out operations in the village of Darulnicma in the Adan Yabal district in the Middle Shabelle region and killed a number of Al-Shabaab fighters.

Officials from the armed forces who spoke to the national media said that almost 50 of the Al-Shabaab fighters there were killed in an operation carried out by the cooperating forces.

Somali government forces and local militias have been carrying out non-stop operations in the Middle Shabelle regions.