As rival forces pounded each with heavy artillery on several frontlines, witnesses said the planes bombed the runways at airports in the capital Mogadishu and Baledogle, about 90 kilometres (55 miles) to the northwest.

"I have seen a jet dropping a bomb on the runway, everybody in the airport was scared when the explosion was heard," Mahad Alasaow, a Mogadishu airport employee, told AFP Monday.

"I have seen an Ethiopian military plane firing a bomb at Baledogle airport," said Mohamed Ade Nur, a resident told AFP. Islamist officials confirmed the attacks, saying one person was wounded in Mogadishu.

Addis Ababa said it carried out the attacks to stop "unauthorised flights" some of which the Islamists were waiting for.

"Unauthorised flights have been forbidden by the TFG (Transition Federal Government), but some unauthorised flights were observed and that is why the bombardement took place," said Solomon Abebe, the foreign ministry spokesman.

Officials said Sunday Ethiopian troops were heading to Baledogle, from where Islamists received supplies.

The government in Baidoa, which is the only major town it controls, ordered the closure of Somali land, sea and air borders, but it remained unclear how that would be done.

As heavy artillery duels were reported near Baidoa, in the central south of the country, Islamists warned civilians to avoid potential targets of airstrikes.

Witnesses said thousands of terrified civilians were fleeing the conflict, which has compounded the misery for nearly a million people already coping with the aftermath of devastating flooding.

The airport in southern Mogadishu only reopened in July after being closed for 11 years and government officials recently claimed that foreign planes had used it to deliver arms to the Islamists.

The Islamists renewed a call to the international community to step in to halt clashes, which intensified a day after the launch of aerial attacks on the border town of Beledweyne and other outposts on Ethiopia's frontier.

"We call on the international community to act soon about this violation," said Sheikh Mohamed Ibrahim Bilal, a top Islamic commander.

"I call upon the people in Mogadishu to show restraint and stay away from the places where they plan to drop bombs," said Abdurahman Janaqow, the deputy chairman of the Islamists.

Direct Ethiopian intervention is a serious escalation of conflict in the Horn of Africa nation, where Addis Ababa long denied a major military presence beyond trainers and advisers helping the weak government.

Ethiopia has also deployed tanks and troops in Somalia to back the government in Baidoa, about 250 kilometres (155 miles) northwest of Mogadishu.

The nation of about 10 million people was carved up among rival warlords after the ouster in 1991 of its former dictator. A coalition of warlords backs the current transitional government.

Officials said the government had seized control of Beledweyne after the Islamists pulled out, but Janaqow said it was a "tactical retreat."

"We have taken control of Beledweyne and our forces are chasing the terrorists," said Yusuf Dabo Geed, a government officer.

"We have killed more than 60 Islamists, wounded others and captured some as prisoners of war," the official added, but the figures could not be confirmed.

In the capital, the Islamists called off an anti-Ethiopian rally for fear of further attacks.

An AFP correspondent in Beledweyne said an convoy of Ethiopian military trucks entered the town early Monday, accompanying the region's government-appointed governor Yusuf Ahmed Hagar, who had fled when the Islamists seized the town.

"We came here to save our people," Hagar told reporters, flanked by Ethiopian troops. He added that the government would eventually retake the whole region and dismantle the Islamic courts that had been set up.

The death toll from six days of battle remains unclear, with both sides claiming to have killed hundreds.

Heavy fighting began on December 20 after the expiry of an ultimatum by the Islamists for Ethiopia to pull out its troops, heightening fears of a conflict that could draw in Ethiopia's foe, Eritrea.

The UN World Food Programme, which is dropping relief supplies to Somalis affected by recent flooding, called on both sides "to allow humanitarian operations to continue unhindered and in safety."

Source: Yahoo! News

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