African Union troops have recaptured the crucial town of Afgoye from al Shabaab rebels but thousands of civilians have fled to Mogadishu to escape the fighting.<br/> <br />The United Nations refugee agency said on Friday more than 6, 000 had been displaced by the gun battles at Afgoye.<br/> <br />Kilian Kleinschmidt, deputy humanitarian co-ordinator for Somalia, says there are reports of civilians being wounded.<br/> <br />SOUNDBITE: DEPUTY HUMANITARIAN CO-ORDINATOR FOR SOMALIA, KILIAN KLEINSCHMIDT, SAYING (English):<br/> <br />"We have received or we have heard about other civilians who have been injured by either mortars or stray bullets, but that we cannot verify at this moment, but I have seen one woman."<br/> <br />Aisha Mohamed Adan, a mother of four children, says she was shot in the neck in her own home in a settlement in the Afgoye area.<br/> <br />Salima Hussein Ahmed was found after several days, severely malnourished, in her makeshift shelter and brought to hospital for treatment.<br/> <br />These were the scenes on Wednesday as African Union troops advanced on the town of Afgoye.<br/> <br />It's a strategic junction town on the road from Mogadishu to the south of Somalia about 30 kilometres outside the capital.<br/> <br />Its capture will help secure a corridor to the capital, allowing aid to reach displaced civilians.<br/> <br />The area known as the Afgoye corridor is home to what's believed to be the biggest concentration of internally displaced people in the world.<br/> <br />The AU says securing the corridor would give some 400, 000 people access to aid.<br/> <br />Al Shabaab is behind a bloody five-year insurgency intended to remove Somalia's Western-backed government.<br/> <br />It wants to impose its own interpretation of Islamic, or sharia, law instead.<br/> <br />Paul Chapman, Reuters
