Rebels Battle Military for Control of Somalia Capital : Africa: President Siad Barre is reported to be directing operations from a bunker near the airport.

Heavy fighting was reported in Somalia’s capital, Mogadishu, between government and rebel forces Monday, and Italian Radio said that hundreds had been killed.

An Italian diplomat in Somalia said President Mohamed Siad Barre was in a bunker near the airport, directing operations against rebels who had captured part of the city earlier in the day.

The diplomat, embassy counselor Claudio Pacifico, said, “The president is at his command post together with the government and is leading operations.”

He added that the presidential palace had been bombed. He said Italy is trying to bring about a cease-fire in its former colony on the Horn of Africa.

According to Pacifico’s eyewitness account, fighting was continuing in the streets of the capital Monday evening.

“The rebel forces are in control of some areas of the city and fighting with heavy weapons continues around the presidential palace,” Pacifico said from the nearby Italian mission.

In Washington, State Department spokesman David Denny said the fighting had subsided Monday night after Sunday’s outbreak, which involved mortars, machine guns and rocket-propelled grenades.

Somali Radio, monitored by the British Broadcasting Corp., quoted Prime Minister Mohamed Hawadle Madar as saying the armed forces had beaten back the heavily armed rebels from the Wardigley district of Mogadishu, where the palace is located.

In Rome, Italian Radio said hundreds of people have been killed in the fighting. It said the casualties included soldiers and civilians but gave no detailed figures.

The main evening newscast said fighting continued in the streets of the capital but less violently than in the past few days. The radio described the scene in Mogadishu as “apocalyptic” and reported that the presidential palace was a heap of smoking ruins.

The Italian news agency Ansa quoted Western diplomats as saying that two Somali generals and “dozens and dozens” of government troops were killed in the fighting in Mogadishu.

Rebel groups differed in their versions of events.

The United Somali Congress, in a statement issued through its Rome office, said its forces captured radio and television headquarters in the capital Monday.

Earlier, the congress said rebels controlled most of Mogadishu and that the president was at the airport preparing to flee.

But a spokesman for another rebel group, the Somali National Movement, said in London that Siad Barre was holed up in a military barracks in the capital and that rebels controlled only five of Mogadishu’s 13 districts.

Siad Barre has been president of the single-party republic since a coup in October, 1969.

Both rebel groups said in August that they would cooperate on trying to overthrow Siad Barre. The rebels rejected as mere cosmetics his recent efforts to liberalize one-party rule--in force since he came to power--and to call in opposition groups for peace talks.

“With Siad Barre there could not be democracy,” the congress spokesman said. “The Somali population are fed up with him.”

The two rebel groups already controlled much of the country when fighting reached the capital in early December.

BACKGROUND

Civil war and the withdrawal of foreign aid have ravaged the economy of Somalia, an Islamic society of about 5.9 million people. Its territory was divided among Britain, Italy, France and Ethiopia in the late 19th Century. It gained independence July 1, 1960, and President Mohamed Siad Barre seized power in a 1969 coup. Rebel guerrillas launched an offensive in May, 1988, nearly capturing the strategic cities of Hargeisa and Berbera. The government regained control after three months of heavy fighting. Siad Barre scheduled multi-party elections for Feb. 1, 1991, and stepped down as party chief when a new constitution came into effect in October. But five rebel groups joined forces in an alliance vowing to topple his government.