Blasts in Somali capital kills 18

At least 18 people have been killed in the Somali capital Mogadishu with two blasts ripping through a busy parking lot next to a restaurant.

"There were two heavy explosions at a parking lot near the National Theatre," police officer Mohamed Adan said on Saturday.

"At least 18 people were killed in the attack," said Mohamed Dahir, another police officer.

An AFP reporter said he had seen 12 bodies at the scene of the attack.

Police and witnesses said the first blast was a car laden with explosives that was parked by a restaurant, the Village, close to the theatre.

"Minutes after the bomb went off, I saw severed flesh flying past," said Idris Yusuf, who was in the restaurant at the time of the attack and sustained slight leg injuries.

Nearby buildings were destroyed by the blasts, he said, and passers-by came running over to help the victims.

The second blast, which followed minutes later, was a "suicide bomber who blew himself up in the crowd of civilians who rushed to the scene of the first blast," said Ahmed Weli Said, a Somali government security official.

The National Theatre re-opened in 2012 after two decades.

Just weeks later, al-Qaeda-linked Shebab insurgents struck, with a suicide bomber blowing herself up and killing two of the country's top sporting officials who were attending an event there.

Somalia's embattled government, selected in November in a UN-backed process, was hailed at the time by the international community as offering the best chance for peace in Somalia since the collapse of the central government in 1991.

A 17,700-strong African Union force fighting alongside the national army has forced Shebab fighters from several towns in the past two years.

Shebab fighters, who have claimed responsibility for a string of recent attacks, remain a potent force, however.

Their most brazen recent attack was a suicide commando assault on a fortified UN compound in the centre of Mogadishu in June that killed 11.