Somali Islamists say 2 leaders killed in air strike

Two senior leaders of Somalia's Islamist movement were killed when four planes dropped bombs over the house they were staying in early Thursday morning, an Islamist commander said.

"It is true that infidel planes bombed Dusamareb. Two of our important people, including Aden Hashi Eyrow, were killed in the incident," Mukhtar Robow Adumansur, a senior commander of the Islamists, told Reuters.

The leaders belonged to al Shabaab, the military wing of a sharia courts movement ousted at the end of 2006, that is on a U.S. list of terrorist organisations.

"An American plane bombed the house of al Shaabab leader Aden Hashi Eyrow," one resident told Reuters.

"I could see pieces of human bodies lying outside the house. It was difficult to go in because of heavily armed Islamists guarding the area."

Another resident said the town was woken up by two loud explosion at about 2 a.m.

"When we came out, we saw a home in the neighbourhood entirely destroyed by two missiles fired by planes flying over us. We counted four planes," said Amina Warsame, a resident of the town that is in central Somalia.

Branded terrorists by Washington, al Shabaab has led an Iraq-style insurgency against the government and its Ethiopian allies since early 2007.

The insurgency began when the Islamic Courts Union, of which Al Shabaab was a part, lost control of Mogadishu.