Suspected al Shabaab militants kill at least 12 in northern Kenya ambush
Mon May 19, 2014 8:44pm GMT
* Three police reservists among dead - disaster agency
* Police say searching for seven others "missing in action"
* Ambush comes after jets attack militant base in Somalia
By Noor Ali
ISIOLO, Kenya, May 19 (Reuters) - Suspected Somali al Shabaab militants
killed at least 12 people in an ambush in northern Kenya on Monday, a day
after Kenyan jets pounded the Islamists' bases over the border, disaster and
police officials said.
The east African nation, which sent its troops into Somalia in October 2011
to pursue the militants, has suffered a string of gun, bomb and grenade
attacks that it blames on al Shabaab, including an attack in the capital
Nairobi on Friday.
Britain, the United States and other Western governments have warned
holidaymakers against visiting Kenya.
"Twelve individuals, among them three police reservists killed in Mandera
County in an ambush by suspected al Shabaab militia on Monday afternoon,"
the government-run National Disaster Operations Centre said on its Twitter
feed.
It said two police vehicles had been destroyed. Reservists work alongside
the police, and are not usually in official uniform but sometimes wear
camouflage jackets.
Mandera County, near the border with Ethiopia and Somalia, has seen a marked
escalation in tension, with low-key clan clashes displacing hundreds of
people in the past year.
The region is awash with guns due to its proximity to Somalia, where al
Shabaab has been fighting to topple the government, and Ethiopia, where the
armed Oromo Liberation Front has made incursions into the country.
The NDOC was not immediately available for further comment about how the
ambush happened or who else had been killed.
Noah Mwivanda, Mandera County police commander, said police were searching
for another seven people "missing in action" and that the attackers had also
set fire to a van transporting qat, a plant chewed as a stimulant.
"Two regular police, three reservists and two civilians are missing in
action, an operation is being conducted to find them. They are either dead,
abducted or missing," Mwivanda told Reuters.
On Sunday, Kenyan military officials said its warplanes hit an
explosives-making compound at Jilib, some 300 km southwest of Mogadishu, two
days after explosions at a market in Nairobi left at least 12 people dead.
Al Shabaab killed at least 67 people in a gun and grenade raid on a Nairobi
shopping mall last September, claiming it as revenge for attacks on its
fighters by Kenyan troops in Somalia. (Additional reporting by Humphrey
Malalo in Nairobi; Writing by James Macharia and George Obulutsa; Editing by
Alison Williams)
Back-to-back blasts kill at least 10 in Kenyan capital
Fri May 16, 2014 2:57pm GMT
* Kenya hit by series of bomb, gun attacks
* Tourists evacuated from coastal town
* No claim of responsibility for blasts
* Past attacks blamed on Somali-linked militants (Adds comments from
witness, president and hotel manager)
By Drazen Jorgic and Humphrey Malalo
NAIROBI, May 16 (Reuters) - Back-to-back explosions killed at least 10
people in a packed Nairobi market on Friday, extending a spate of attacks
that have piled pressure on the government and spurred Britain and other
Western nations to warn citizens about travelling to Kenya.
Close to 70 people were wounded in the two blasts, Kenya's National Disaster
Operations Centre (NDOC) said, and the Kenya Red Cross appealed for blood
donations to help the injured.
One explosion struck a minibus taxi, shattering the windows and flattening
its tyres. It was near a market best known for selling second-hand clothes
from wooden stalls with corrugated iron roofs. The second blast occurred
near the same market.
Outside the blood-spattered minibus, clothes littered a street that had been
bustling with shoppers earlier in the day.
"I saw the explosion. People were running in all directions," a woman at the
scene told journalists. "I know some of the people who died."
Nairobi County Police Commander Benson Kibui told journalists that one
suspect was arrested near the market and another was detained elsewhere,
without giving details.
There was no immediate claim of responsibility.
In the past such attacks have been widely blamed on the Somali Islamist
militant group al Shabaab, which wants Kenyan troops out of Somalia. In
September, gunmen from the group killed 67 people in an raid on a Nairobi
shopping mall.
Kenya, an important Western regional ally, has suffered a string of bomb and
gun attacks since its troops entered Somalia to battle al Shabaab, which had
carried out cross-border raids and kidnappings in Kenya.
Many of the attacks have been along Kenya's Indian Ocean coast, including
the port of Mombasa, a tourist favourite. Some others have been in Nairobi,
mainly near the Somali-populated Eastleigh district. Friday's blasts were
close to Eastleigh.
Tourism in the east African nation had already been damaged by kidnappings
by Somali pirates in the north near the Somali border, though that threat
has subsided over the past 18 months.
Kenyan authorities had hoped for a respite to rebuild the struggling
industry.
One immediate commercial victim of Friday's bombings was a regional telecoms
conference, East African Com, due to be held in Nairobi next week.
Organisers said security worries forced it to cancel the meeting, which
attracts top industry executives.
TOURISTS LEAVE
The latest blasts came a day after Kenya rebuked Britain, the United States,
France and Australia for issuing travel warnings. Hundreds of tourists have
left resorts on the Indian Ocean coast ahead of schedule as a result.
"Yesterday night, 282 tourists flew out and today 300 more are going away,"
Sam Ikwaye, of the Kenya Hotel Keepers and Caterers, told Reuters in
Mombasa, one of several areas the British government said tourists should
avoid or leave.
Diplomats have privately said Kenya's security forces have been hampered in
their work by inter-agency rivalries in the past and also say the government
has not done enough to reassure Kenyans and others that it is stepping up
security in the wake of the Nairobi Westgate shopping mall assault.
The government says it has not been credited for all the attacks it says it
has foiled, but instead is criticised for the few that get through.
President Uhuru Kenyatta urged Kenyans to help the government in its battle
against "terrorism" and dismissed the Western travel warnings as steps that
"only strengthen the will of terrorists" instead of helping Kenya defeat
them.
"Terrorism is not an evil that was born in Kenya. Terrorism is a worldwide
phenomenon," Kenyatta told a previously planned news conference held soon
after the latest explosions.
Kibui said the blasts were caused by a Improvised Explosive Device (IED), a
reference to a hand-made bomb.
Seven people were killed two weeks ago when explosions struck Nairobi and
Mombasa. (Additional reporting by James Macharia in Nairobi, George Obulutsa
and Joseph Akwiri in Mombasa; Writing by Drazen Jorgic; Editing by Edmund
Blair/Mark Heinrich)