Unidentified gunmen shot dead the British headmaster of a Somaliland boarding school and his wife.
Richard Eyeington (62) and his wife, Enid (61), were shot through the window of their apartment at the Sheikh Secondary School in Sheikh, Somaliland.
The bodies of the two Britons, who worked for the Austrian aid agency SOS Children's Village, were discovered today, and five bullet casings were found nearby on the floors.
Mr Dahir Riyaleh Kahin, president of the breakaway republic of Somaliland, said: "We will spare no efforts in bringing the culprits to justice, and we will fight to the end to insure that such killings are not repeated."
He said that the killing of the two Britons and that of an Italian woman two weeks ago was aimed at damaging Somaliland, the western half of a former Britishcolony in the Horn of Africa.
Dr Hussein Bulhan, executive director of the Academy for Peace and Development in the Somaliland capital Hargeisa, said the Austrian agency had worked hard to restore the school that had been destroyed in 1989 when forces loyal to former Somali president Mohammed Siad Barre attacked the region to stifle dissent.
"Everybody here is dumbfounded and outraged. These were people dedicated to Somaliland and to rebuilding the education system," Mr Bulhan said.
British Somaliland and Italian Somaliland joined together in 1960 to form the independent nation of Somalia. That nation disintegrated in January 1991 when Siad Barre was ousted.