Heavy gunfire rang out across central Mogadishu on Friday as Somali troops battled to dislodge insurgents holed up next to a hotel they bombed the previous evening, and as the death toll stemming from that attack neared 30.

Heavy gunfire rang out across central Mogadishu on Friday as Somali troops battled to dislodge insurgents holed up next to a hotel they bombed the previous evening, and as the death toll stemming from that attack neared 30.