Three police officers and one civilian have been killed in a car bombing outside a police academy in the Somali capital, and a spokesman for an Islamic extremist group says it has repelled an attack by international forces.
A suicide car bomber detonated an explosives-laden vehicle outside a cafe near the academy in Mogadishu on Wednesday, General Ali Hersi Barre said.
There was no claim of responsibility for the blast, but it bore the hallmarks of al-Shabaab.
The Islamic extremist group said on Wednesday its fighters had foiled an attempt by foreign forces to raid an al-Shabaab-held town in southern Somalia during the night.
Spokesman Sheikh Abdiaziz Abu Musab told a militant-run online radio that unidentified foreign forces with two helicopters tried to launch a ground attack on a military station in Awdhegle town in Lower Shabelle region before they were repelled.
Al-Shabaab fighters pressed the foreign forces dropped off by helicopter to retreat with casualties after more than 30 minutes of clashes.
No country has said it carried out the attack alleged by the group.
The Pentagon has said US forces carried out air strikes on a training camp run by al-Shabaab on Saturday, killing more than 150 of the group's fighters.
Despite being ousted from Mogadishu and surrounding regions, al-Shabaab continues to launch guerilla attacks across the Horn of Africa country.
The group has also carried out many attacks in neighbouring Kenya, whose military involvement in Somalia is opposed by the Islamic extremists.
