Reuters witnesses saw several bodies at the scene of the blast near the vegetable market in Mogadishu's Waberi district, where shops and stalls were wrecked and ambulances raced away with casualties. Pools of blood lay on the ground.
The Somali Islamist group al Shabaab often carries out such attacks in the capital, although there was no immediate claim of responsibility by the group, which wants to topple the Western-backed government and impose its strict interpretation of Islam.