Paul and Rachel Chandler, who are being held hostage by Somali pirates

A British man being held hostage by Somali pirates is suffering from a serious eye infection which could leave him blind, it has been reported.

Paul Chandler, from Tunbridge Wells, Kent, and his wife Rachel have been held for more than four months after they were captured while sailing from the Seychelles towards Tanzania.

A photographer who has filmed the couple since they were captured said the pirates have requested medicine to treat Mr Chandler's eyes.

Mohamed Dahir, a Somali freelance photographer, said the group contacted Dr Mohamed Helmi Hangul, in Mogadishu, who had assessed the couple previously.

Somalia was never an extreme Islamic society, but over past 20 years with flow of radical Islamist ideas, women and men have to dress in certain manner or suffer at hands of religious police!

MOGADISHU — Armed with assault rifles and scissors, the Shebab's religious police are imposing a reign of terror -- as well as crew cuts and bushy beards -- on Somalia's youth.

Wearing a T-shirt with a Western print, a pair of tight jeans and wavy gelled back hair, Ahmed Aydarus Abdi is a dedicated follower of fashion, but not the style advocated in the Shebab's hardline Wahhabi brand of Islam.

"I was stopped by Shebab gunmen who asked me questions about my haircut. They said the way I designed my hair was very silly," he said.

"Without waiting for my reply, one of the gunmen pulled out a pair of scissors and cut off huge locks on one side of my head. He was dealing with it like it was grass, not human hair," Abdi said.

As he recounted how he reluctantly had to finish the job himself, the 19-year-old cast worried glances around him, aware that his appearance was likely still offensive to the canons of Shebab sartorial elegance.

Fleeing civil war and poverty, Somalis take rickety boats to Yemen, the poorest Arab country. Yemen officials say they have a 'moral obligation' to accept the refugees, many of whom don't make it.

Reporting from Mukalla, Yemen - Holding her baby above her head, Rihanna Mohammed tumbled out of a boat in rough seas and swam to the Yemeni shore.

"It is a wicked, wicked journey," said the refugee from Somalia, her feet wrinkled and yellowed, her face speckled white with sand. "Waves were crashing over us the whole way. We were terrified."

But she was lucky. Mohammed, her 1-year-old daughter and 48 others made it alive, fleeing the war and poverty of their native land for the uncertainties of a new one. Thousands make the journey every week in fleets of battered fishing boats sailed by smugglers.

Nairobi/Mogadishu ­ Humanitarian group Medecins Sans Frontieres (Doctors Without Borders, MSF) on Wednesday called on all parties in Somalia's bloody conflict to minimize civilian casualties as it treated dozens of women and children injured in recent fighting. Fighting has flared up again in the last few weeks as Islamist insurgent groups al-Shabaab and Hizbul Islam push to topple the weak Western-backed government.

Dozens have died in the capital Mogadishu as the insurgents and government forces, backed by African Union peacekeepers, exchange mortar fire.

"The numbers of injured women and children that we received in just over 72 hours is not 'collateral damage,' it's a total lack of regard for the safety of civilians," said MSF Head of Mission Axelle de la Motte St Pierre.

Soldiers attend to the wounded from a rebel attack in Mogadishu last week

GENEVA — Some 258 civilians were killed in clashes between government troops and rebel militia in central Somalia last month, the UNHCR said Tuesday, making January the deadliest month since August.

"Violence in Somalia sharply escalated in January, resulting in hundreds of civilian deaths and widespread destruction," said Andrej Mahecic, spokesman of the UN refugees agency.

"According to local sources, intense clashes between government forces and militia groups fighting for control of the conflict-torn central regions have left at least 258 civilians dead and another 253 wounded, which makes January the deadliest month since last August," he said.

The fighting displaced over 80,000 Somalis during the month, including 18,000 who fled their homes in the capital Mogadishu, the UNHCR said.

Paul and Rachel Chandler are being held by Somali pirates Photo: MOHAMED DAHIR, AFP, Getty Images

The British Government has been accused of blocking an independent negotiator from agreeing a ransom for British couple Paul and Rachel Chandler, who are being held by Somali pirates.

Maritime security expert Nick Davis also warned that the frail couple could soon be abandoned to fend for themselves in the perilous country if their captors lose patience.

He claims to have arranged talks with those holding them to secure their release for about £100,000 ($160,000) last year.

However, he said the Foreign Office failed to give the green light for the deal and that he had been forced to abandon the talks.

The revelation came following a harrowing film which shows the emaciated and frightened Chandlers making a fresh appeal for freedom.

The couple, from Tunbridge Wells, Kent, were seized from their yacht Lynn Rival in the Indian Ocean on October 23 and are being held in separate locations in central Somalia.

Mogadishu - Somalia's al-Qaeda-inspired Shebab Islamists on Thursday publicly chopped off the right hand of a man accused of stealing cellphones, witnesses and officials said.

The punishment took place in the southern port town of Merka under the control of the extremist group, and where they have imposed strict sharia, or Islamic law.

"This punishment is part of broad effort to implement sharia in the country. Anybody who steals gets his hands chopped off," said Sheikh Isa Mohamed, a Shebab official.

The judge in the Islamic court in the region announced the sentence after the convict confessed to the charges against him.

Paul and Rachel Chandler: kidnapped on 23 October. Photograph: AP

The British couple being held hostage by pirates in Somalia believe they will be killed within days.

Paul Chandler, who was captured with his wife Rachel on October 23 last year while sailing from the Seychelles, said that the pirates had set a deadline of “three or four” days for a ransom to be paid.

Mr Chandler, 59, said in a telephone interview that the pirates had separated him from his 55-year-old wife, an economist, adding that she told him she had been beaten with a rifle butt and was being “tormented” by her captors.

In the interview with ITV News, Mr Chandler, a retired quantity surveyor from Tunbridge Wells, Kent, likened their conditions in solitary confinement to the treatment of a captive animal.

In a scene straight out of the Dark Ages, this Somali man accused of adultery was stoned to death by Islamic thugs while horrified villagers were forced to watch.

Mohamed Abukar Ibrahim, 48, was buried in a hole up to his chest and then pelted with rocks by fighters from the rebel group Hizbul Islam on Saturday in Afgoye, about 20 miles from the capital, Mogadishu.