At least 12 former soldiers were killed in the shelling [Reuters]
At least 12 former soldiers were killed in the shelling [Reuters]
The shells fired by opposition fighters missed their intended target in Mogadishu, the capital, and hit a residential area containing the hospital, Somali officials said on Saturday.
Disabled veterans are among 15 people killed after mortar rockets fired by fighters in Somalia hit a war veterans' hospital.
"I was sitting in my wheelchair about 10 metres away from my friends when a mortar exploded and smoke and dust covered us all," Mohamed Abdi, 50, a paralysed ex-soldier said.
"I saw my friends on the ground, with blood scattered everywhere like slaughtered goats."
Three civilians also died and 15 other veterans were wounded in the attack on Friday.
Overthrow attempt
The mortars were believed to have been fired towards Mogadishu's port but landed in the residential area by mistake, officials said.
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Disabled die in Somali raid
Former army officers paralysed or missing limbs from the country's 1977 war with Ethiopia resided in the hospital, said Shiek Abdirisaq Oeylow, a government spokesman.
Somalia has suffered civil war for the past 18 years and African Union peacekeepers are currently in the country aiming to back the government of Sheikh Sharif Ahmed.
The government holds only a few areas of Mogadishu and al-Shabab, an opposition group, is attempting to overthrow them with the suspected help of foreign fighters.
The US has accused al-Shabab of having links with al-Qaeda, which al-Sahbab denies.
The Somali  (TFG), the internationally recognized government of the former state of Somalia, could not stop an attack conducted by insurgents in the capital as they shelled the city's port; but, some rounds fell short which led to dozens of casualties.

Late last week, Somali insurgents conducted a mortar attack in downtown Mogadishu missing their intended target at the city's seaport; instead, hitting a veteran's hospital killing between 6 and 9 former soldiers and wounding at least 12 others.  Many of the hospital's patients are veterans from  in the Ogaden, according to government spokesman Shiek Abdirisaq Qeylow.  The disabled veterans were gathering and chatting in the hospital's courtyard ready for the  (Futuru), the feast that breaks the dawn-to-dusk fast observed during the holy Muslim month of Ramadan, when the shells fell, according to the Associated Free Press.  Their home, De Martino Hospital, was collateral damage in what was meant to be an attack on the seaport according to Mohamed Abdiazis, a Somali Policeman.  Victims were taken to the Medina Hospital which is where four of the victims died.  Eyewitnesses said that several rounds hit the seaport and the main jail.  

Although no one has claimed responsibility for the attack, Al-Shabab, the militant youth group that has now taken the reigns of the insurgency in Somalia after the dissolution of the , is widely suspected.  Al-Shabab seeks to institute the strictest sense of Shari'a Law in Somalia and is a seam of contention for their participation in the government.  Earlier this year, the newly elected Somali President agreed to implement tenets of Shar'ia into the nation's statutory codes, however negotiations quickly broke down over the details.

While the TFG has made attempts to quell violence in the capital and in other parts of Somalia, little success has been realized.  The government relies on assistance from the African Union to maintain some semblance of order in Mogadishu.  Parts of the country like Somaliland in the north have claimed de-facto independence in the absence of a central government capable of protecting all parts of the country.