91Èȱ¬

Six civilians have been killed and 10 injured after al-Shabab militants attacked a beachside hotel in the Somali capital, Mogadishu, police say.

Security forces rescued more than 80 guests from the Pearl Beach hotel after a six-hour siege on Friday night.

Three members of the security forces died in the rescue operation and have been praised for their bravery.

All of the attackers were killed in a fierce gun battle with security forces, police said.

Pearl Beach hotel was popular with government officials.

Such places are frequently targeted by al-Shabab insurgents, who have been fighting Somalia's government for more than a decade and retain a stronghold in parts of the country.

People who were caught up in this latest attack described the shocking moment armed men stormed the complex.

"I was sitting near the beach when the first explosion happened at the front gate of the hotel and there was another one at the back," eyewitness Hussein Saddam told the Reuters news agency.

"I saw four dead bodies - two were women and the two others were men... It was a very shocking scene but Allah has saved me."

The Pearl Beach hotel attack comes weeks after al-Shabab militants killed dozens of Ugandan soldiers, who were part of an African Union peacekeeping mission 110km (68 miles) south of the capital in the Lower Shabelle region.