MOGADISHU, Aug 28, 2007 (AFP) - Fighting between Ethiopian troops and insurgents killed two civilians and wounded two others overnight in the Somali capital, where the government is facing a deadly rebellion, witnesses said Tuesday.

The clashes took place in the Suqaholaha and Shirkole districts, some of the most volatile in the city.

"A stray bullet killed a young man in his house," said Suqaholaha resident Abdisalam Mohamed Ali.

Stray fire also killed an eldery man in southern Mogadishu's Shirkole area, resident Mohamed Bashir told AFP.

Elders had warned of renewed clashes and urged civilians to flee areas where Ethiopian forces and Somali government troops are based, fearing that insurgents might strike.

"No one lives under this situation," said Mohamed Hashi, a Shirkole elder told AFP.

"We expect insurgents to strike that is why we are asking civilians to leave areas where government and insurgents are based," he added.

The clashes came two days after Islamists militants vowed to step up their insurgency until Ethiopian forces deployed to bolster the feeble Somali government pulled out of Somalia.

Mogadishu, the epicentre of violence in Somalia, is hosting talks to seeking to reconcile feuding factions and tighten President Abdullahi Yusuf Ahmed's tenuous grip on power in the impoverished nation of 10 million.

But the Islamists who were evicted from Mogadishu in April after months of clashes, are boycotting the parley and have been blamed for numerous attacks the capital.

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