Somalia crisis: Al-Shabab and army 'kill women' Published duration 10 December 2014

image copyright AP image caption Al-Shabab has lost key cities and towns to government and African Union forces

A soldier in Somalia has avenged the killing of his wife by shooting dead five women related to militant Islamists, an official has said.

He suspected that the women had colluded with the murderers of his wife, who was also a soldier, he added.

Al-Shabab gunmen killed his wife and another female soldier in the small south-western town of Tiyeglow on Tuesday night, the official said.

Al-Shabab is fighting to create an Islamic state in Somalia.

It controlled Tiyeglow for about six years, before it fell to government forces this year, reports the BBC's Mohamed Moalimu from the capital, Somalia.

The killing of all seven women has shocked women's rights groups in Somalia, who have noted that it is extremely rare for so many women to be shot dead, he adds.

Mohamed Abdalla Hassan, a government official in Tiyeglow, said al-Shabab gunmen shot dead the two female soldiers during a hit-and-run raid on Tuesday night.

Government forces then picked up the five women on Wednesday on suspicion of helping the gunmen identify their targets, he said.

As the women were being taken to the police station, the soldier confronted them and shot them dead, Mr Hassan added.

Somalia has been without an effective central government since the overthrow of the Siad Barre regime in 1991.

The African Union has some 22,000 troops in the country to help the weak government battle al-Shabab, which is linked to al-Qaeda.