Some of the worst fighting to hit Somalia's capital city in recent months uprooted nearly 34,000 people in less than a week, according to a United Nations report released Monday.
Somalia's hard-line Islamic group Al-Shabab seized control of Jowhar, the president's hometown, after a battle with pro-government forces Sunday.
Ethiopian troops have taken control of the major Somalian town of Jowhar after several hours of heavy fighting with Islamist fighters and their force of about 2,000 soldiers advanced toward Balad, about 20 miles northeast of Mogadishu, according to witnesses.
The United Nations envoy to Somalia has warned of a "deteriorating situation" in the Horn of Africa nations and called for the U.N. Security Council to take steps to end the violence in the country.
Militia fighters in Somalia affiliated with the Islamic Courts Union are taking power from clan-based secular warlords. The warlords are blamed for dragging the war-torn nation into a state of lawlessness that has lasted nearly 16 years.
The United Nations' World Food Program (WFP) appealed Tuesday for $6.7 million to feed nearly a quarter of a million Sudanese and Somali refugees living in camps in Kenya.
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