Nearly 20 people were killed and more than 80 others wounded on Friday after Somali government forces launched an offensive against opposition insurgent fighters who took a number of key positions in last week's clashes with government forces, officials and witnesses said.

Somali government troops who initially reclaimed part of positions lost to the insurgents last week were pushed back as heavy machine guns and artillery shells bounded residential areas in both insurgent and government forces held areas in the south of the restive Somali capital.

Somali Defense Minister Mohamed Gandhi described the government offensive as an operation to rid the capital of what he termed as anti-peace elements. Gandhi revealed that Somali government forces would continue the offensive until its objectives are met.

Health officials said local ambulance services witnessed 15 civilian deaths while ambulances ferried nearly 80 wounded people, most of them civilians caught in the crossfire.

"I and my colleagues saw 15 dead bodies as we were ferrying wounded people to the hospitals. We took 80 between us," Isse Ali, one of the ambulance drivers told Xinhua.

The figure was also confirmed by health workers in the Medina hospital in Mogadishu.

Witnesses also said they saw four dead Somali government soldiers and one insurgent fighter killed in the fighting which Somali government military officers say is aimed at flushing out insurgent fighters in Mogadishu.

Somali Prime Minister Abdurashid Sharmarke on Thursday said the insurgent are not interested in peace and "only know the language of the gun", vowing his government would fight the insurgents who he accused of having foreign fighters in their ranks.

Previous efforts by local religious and community leaders to meditate between two sides failed to bring them to negotiation as insurgent leaders insisted on the withdrawal of African Union peacekeeping forces from Mogadishu where they protect important government institutions.

Clashes between Somali government forces and insurgent fighters for the past twelve days led to the death of nearly 150 people and injury of more than 500 others. Nearly 50,000 others were displaced from their homes in Mogadishu amid the clashes.

Somalia, a country of nine million, was plagued by civil strife and has been without a strong central government since the overthrow of the late Somali president Mohamed Siyad Barre in 1991.

(Xinhua News Agency May 23, 2009)