Two French security advisers are abducted from the Sahafi Hotel in Mogadishu. Somali Foreign Ministry issues a statement the following day confirming that the two had arrived a week prior at the invitation of the Defence Ministry to train "their counterparts in Somali intelligence agencies". The two, reportedly abducted by a government unit, are handed over to Hizbul Islam, and subsequently to Al-Shabab to "avert bloodshed" according to reports quoting the leader of Hizbul Islam.