MOGADISHU, Aug 18 (Reuters) - Gunmen in southern Somalia killed an employee of the U.N.'s World Food Programme (WFP), the relief agency said on Monday.

Abdulkadir Diad Mohamed, a Somali who joined WFP in June as an administration and finance assistant, was apparently abducted and then shot dead when he tried to escape.

Kidnappings and killings are common in the Horn of Africa nation, where insurgents have been battling the country's interim government since the start of last year.

Some attacks are political but others are the result of lawlessness in a desperately poor country awash with weapons.

"WFP does not believe his death to be related to the recent spate of targeted attacks on aid workers in Somalia," WFP said in a statement without elaborating.

WFP said details were still being gathered but it appeared Mohamed, 33, was killed on Friday while visiting his home in Dinsor.

It said the driver of the vehicle he was using -- who was not a WFP staff member -- was also killed, while a third member of their group managed to escape.

It was the first violent death of a WFP staff member in Somalia since 1993, although five drivers working for WFP contractors have been killed since the start of the year.

"I am shocked by this senseless and barbaric attack on one of our staff. Our thoughts and prayers are with his family, friends and colleagues," WFP's Executive Director Josette Sheeran said in the statement.

The fighting in Somalia has triggered a humanitarian crisis that aid workers say may be the worst in Africa.

At least a million people have been uprooted by the violence since early last year, and their plight has been compounded by record high food prices, hyper-inflation and drought.

WFP said experts fear the number of Somalis needing food aid could reach 3.5 million people later this year -- nearly half the impoverished country's population.

More than 8,000 civilians have been killed and 1 million forced from their homes by fighting since early last year.

The United Nations warned last month that international donors had so far funded only about a third of a $637 million aid appeal for Somalia. (