In August 2008, an improvised explosive device intended for a passing A.U. convoy, killed 21 women picking up rubbish on Maka al-Mukarama Road - a major thoroughfare that is guarded by African Union peacekeepers and considered one of the few safe zones left in the capital.

Mogadishu today stands in stark contrast to what the capital was like before the al-Shabab-led insurgency intensified against the U.N.-backed Transitional Federal Government and its international backers in 2008 and 2009.

Maka al-Mukarama extends from the junction at Kilometer Four - so named because it is located four kilometers into the city from the international airport. Once one of the busiest intersections in Mogadishu, Kilometer Four is now marked by rows of concrete barriers that keep people and cars far away from a group of peacekeepers based nearby. A Soviet-era tank sits ominously at the intersection, ready to fire at a moment's notice.

Since 2008, thousands have been killed and nearly one-million others driven out of the city amid an escalating war between militant Islamists and the African Union peacekeeping force known as AMISOM.

A total of 5,300 peacekeepers from Uganda and Burundi are defending a small area, mostly in the southern part of the capital, trying to prevent al-Shabab from toppling the government and seizing the entire city. Al-Shabab has been trying to demoralize AMISOM through repeated attacks, including two separate suicide attacks on its bases last year that killed and wounded nearly two dozen African Union troops.