Britain on Saturday denied claims by Somlia's al-Qaida-linked Shebab that British special forces were involved in an attack on a key insurgent base.

A spokesman for the Islamist group said "Britons and Turks" staged the operation in which commandos rappelled from a helicopter as they tried to storm a house belonging to a senior Shebab commander in the southern Somali port of Barawe.

Foreign special forces in an attack helicopter staged a nighttime raid on a key base of Somalia's al-Qaida-linked Shebab, the insurgents said Saturday, claiming the assault had failed.

"The enemy of Allah tried to surprise the mujahedeen commanders with a night attack using a military helicopter, but they were taught a lesson and they have failed," Mohamed Abu Suleiman, the Shebab commander in the southern Somali port of Barawe, told Agence France Presse.

Gunmen have kidnapped a journalist from one of Pakistan's tribal areas on the Afghan border, where Taliban militants are active, relatives said Friday.

Lal Wazir, 38, who works for a local newspaper in the South Waziristan town of Azam Warsak was taken from a shop by six masked gunmen on Thursday, his uncle Ibrahim Wazir told Agence France Presse.

Four rioters died and a church was torched amid gunfire Friday, as police in Kenya's port city of Mombasa quashed protests sparked by the killing of a Muslim cleric.

Battles broke out as armed paramilitary police moved towards a mosque, whose leaders have been accused of links to Somalia's Islamist Shebab, insurgents who massacred 67 in Nairobi's Westgate shopping mall last month.

At least 50 asylum-seekers drowned and 120 were rescued after a boat carrying some 500 people caught fire and capsized near an Italian island on Thursday, officials and media reports said.

The Italian news agency Ansa cited officials as saying 50 bodies had been recovered including those of two children and several women.

Police in Somalia said Wednesday they were questioning a man accused of beheading four of his children more than three years after divorcing their mother.

Omar Shire Hassan was apprehended late Tuesday by the police in the central Somalia town of Beledweyne, situated about 300 kilometers (190 miles) north of the capital, a few hours after allegedly murdering the children who were between three and eight years old.

Somalia's Shebab Islamists threatened Wednesday to step up militant attacks against Kenya, after Nairobi refused to pull its troops out of Somalia.

The al-Qaida linked Shebab claimed responsibility for last week's attack on Nairobi's Westgate shopping mall, in which at least 67 people died, with 39 more listed as missing by the Red Cross.

Kenyan lawmakers investigating alleged security failings during the deadly assault on Nairobi's Westgate mall by Islamist gunmen were due to meet Tuesday, as leaders gathered to commemorate the 67 killed.

Politicians from both parliament's national security and defense and foreign relations committees visited the mall on Monday afternoon, picking their way through shattered glass and pools of congealed blood in the main hall.

Somalia's Shebab Islamists insisted Monday that no woman joined them in an attack on Nairobi's Westgate shopping mall, dismissing speculation that British 'White Widow' Samantha Lewthwaite took part in the massacre.

"We once again openly declare that no woman was involved at Westgate," Shebab said on Twitter, reiterating it had a policy of "not employing sisters for such missions".

At least 39 people are still missing after last week's brutal assault on Nairobi's Westgate mall by Islamist gunmen, the Red Cross said Monday.

The four-day bloodbath at the upmarket shopping mall, which Kenyan forces brought to an end on Tuesday, left at least 67 people dead.