MOGADISHU, April 03, 2007 – Thousands of Somalis were fleeing violence on foot or by donkey, car or truck yesterday in an exodus that was massive even by the standards of a city that has become a byword for war.

But once away from the bullets and missiles, the Somalis have to contend with thieves, hunger, thirst and lack of shelter, aid agencies said.

"I saw a young man taken out of a truck and killed in front of the passengers," said Imam Abukar Abdi Ibrahim, a clan elder from Mogadishu, after reaching the relative safety of Somaliland, a self-declared independent region.

He and other refugees recounted how thieves were preying on those fleeing, stripping them of money and the few goods they carried.

"Some were robbed of their cars and had to walk for miles," Ibrahim added.

The United Nations sounded the alarm over the refugee situation yesterday, saying 47 000 had fled the city in the last 10 days and were living in appalling conditions.

Most had gone to the Lower Shabelle region south of Mogadishu, the UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) said.

"With internally displaced people begging on the streets, sleeping without shade and suffering from diarrhoea, people are forced to make their way further and further from Mogadishu, due to dwindling resources and deteriorating conditions," it said.

Due to the crowds trying to get out of the city, people were taking up to four hours to get on the road, UNHCR said.

About 96 000 people have left the city since February in the latest of the periodic mass exoduses from the capital during 15 years of anarchy stretching back to the early 1990s.

Mogadishu , home to at least a million people, was at its calmest when Islamists ran the city for six months last year

But the takeover by the Ethiopian-backed Somali government - and an ensuing insurgency - have rocked the city again.

Hundreds are believed to have died in fighting since Thursday, the worst since a war over the New Year to oust the Islamists, residents say.

Whole blocks have been engulfed in smoke and rubble.

A lull in fighting yesterday was only encouraging the exodus, residents said, as those who had been trapped in neighborhoods under siege took the chance to flee.

Since last week's upsurge in fighting, reporters have seen long queues of people pouring out of the capital, some on foot, others piling possessions on to donkeys, trucks and cars.

"I left Mogadishu after… my husband and elder son died in a bomb explosion at our home. What I could take from my house was very little," said Asha Muddey, an elderly woman with two children.

"I thank God that I and two of my children are safe in Hargeisa."

Source: Reuters