NAIROBI, Aug 20 (Reuters) – Somalian islamist al Shabaab insurgents seized back a southern town from pro-government militiamen on Thursday after fighting that killed at least 12 people, witnesses said.

Western security agencies say Somalia, which has been torn by civil war for the past 18 years, has become a haven for militants plotting attacks in the Horn of Africa and beyond.

Earlier this week, militiamen supporting President Sheikh Sharif Ahmed’s fragile administration chased al Shabaab fighters out of the southern town of Bulahawa without firing at shot.

On Thursday, al Shabaab returned with reinforcements.

Local nurse Abdiraxman Ali said 12 people were killed and eight wounded: “The dead are from both sides, and civilians.”

The United States accuses al Shabaab of being al Qaeda’s proxy in the chaotic nation.

An al Shabaab spokesman in Bulahawa, Sheikh Osman, told Reuters the group had retaken control.

“We have defeated the Ethiopian-backed militia,” he said.

Meanwhile another rebel group, Hizbul Islam, retook control of Luuq town, which is also in Gedo region. They had abandoned it on Wednesday to a pro-government militia. [ID:nLJ085215]

Residents said there was no fighting in Luuq.

The international community is trying to bolster Ahmed’s U.N.-backed government, which controls only parts of the central region and small pockets of the coastal capital Mogadishu.

The Islamist rebels say Ethiopian soldiers are fighting alongside the pro-government militiamen, but a senior official in Addis Ababa denied that.

“Ethiopia has no troops inside Somalia,” Bereket Simon, the Ethiopian government’s head of information, told reporters.

STATE OF EMERGENCY

On Wednesday, Somali lawmakers declared a state of emergency while the government battles the rebels. The move means Ahmed can make major decisions without having to consult parliament.

Violence in Somalia has killed more than 18,000 civilians since the start of 2007 and uprooted another 1 million.

An independent group of Somali elders led by former president Abdiqassim Salad Hassan is attempting to broker a ceasefire deal between the warring parties.

“This is a purely Somali initiative…the opposition groups have not yet accepted a ceasefire, but we are hopeful they will do,” Hassan, who was Somalia’s president between 2001 and 2004, told Reuters from Cairo.

“In the end, we will come up with our recommendation of who is an obstacle to peace in Somalia, and fight against them together with our people.”

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Source: Reuters  (Additional reporting by Abdiaziz Hassan, Ibrahim Mohamed, and Tsegaye Tadesse in Addis Ababa; Writing by Daniel Wallis; Editing by Ralph Boulton)

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