A suspected car bomb is reported to have exploded at a police checkpoint in Somalia.
More than a dozen people were also injured in the attack, which took place at a busy marketplace in the Somalian capital of Mogadishu.
"The whole market is ruined and people perished. The death toll is sure to rise," Colonel Abdikadir Farah, a police officer, told Reuters.
Medical sources told the AFP news agency the death toll could be as high as 30.
No group has yet claimed responsibility for the attack, but immediate suspicion has fallen on the Al-Qaeda linked group al-Shabab, locked in battle against the Somali government and which regularly mounts attacks in the city.
In August, a car bomb situated outside a popular hotel close to the presidential palace left 15 dead.