Cops parade corpses of al-Shabab gunmen through town
Bloodbath threat follows slaughter at university
KENYA’S president yesterday vowed to retaliate in the “severest way” against Somalia’s al-Shabab Islamists after they massacred nearly 150 people in a university.
Two days after the Islamist militants lined up non-Muslim students, taunting them, then executing them in al-Shabab’s bloodiest attack to date, President Uhuru Kenyatta warned they would face justice for the “mindless slaughter”.
The day-long siege at the university in the town of Garissa, close to the border with Somalia, claimed 148 lives, including 142 students, three police officers and three soldiers.
Yesterday, al-Shabab warned of a “long, gruesome war” unless Kenya withdrew its troops from Somalia, and threatened “another bloodbath”.
Hours later, police in Garissa paraded four corpses of gunmen piled on top of each other face down in the back of a pick-up truck followed by a huge crowd. Police insisted the grim display was to see if anyone could identify the assailants, but some onlookers threw stones at the bodies as they passed, while others jeered at the dead.
In Nairobi’s Somali district demonstrators took to the streets to protest against the militants, calling for unity in the country.
Forensic investigators continued to scour the site, where one student shocked security forces — who had said all students were accounted for — by emerging unharmed from a wardrobe where she had hidden for two days.
More than 600 students from the now closed college yesterday boarded buses for their homes around the country.
Kenyatta vows severe retaliation for ‘mindless slaughter’
SOMALIA’s al-Qaeda-linked al-Shabab Islamists threatened Kenyan citizens with “another bloodbath” yesterday, two days after they slaughtered nearly 150 people at a university.
“We will, by the permission of Allah, stop at nothing to avenge the deaths of our Muslim brothers until your government ceases its oppression and until all Muslim lands are liberated from Kenyan occupation,” al-Shabab said in a statement.
“And until then, Kenyan cities will run red with blood . . . this will be a long, gruesome war of which you, the Kenyan public, are its first casualties.”
The day-long siege on Thursday of the university in the northeastern town of Garissa was Kenya’s deadliest attack since the 1998 bombing of the US embassy in Nairobi, and the bloodiest ever by al-Shabab militants. Al-Shabab, in an e-mail in English, described how they had singled out non-Muslims to kill, gathering them together before executing them.
The statement was confirmed as genuine by a spokesman.
Survivors who hid from the attack have recounted how the gunmen called on people to come out of their dormitory rooms and lie face down, but then killed them. A photograph from inside the building showed more than 50 dead students lying on the ground.
“The mujahedeen stormed the university compound and swiftly proceeded to the halls of residence where they had gathered all the occupants,” the statement added.
“And since the attack target- ed only non-Muslims, all Muslims were allowed to safely evacuate the premises before the disbelievers were executed.”
The statement also described what it called “unspeakable atrocities against the Muslims of East Africa” by Kenyan security forces, both in Kenya’s northeastern ethnic Somali region and in southern Somalia, when Nairobi sent troops in 2011 to battle the Islamists.
The gunmen in Garissa wanted to “avenge the deaths of thousands of Muslims killed at the hands of the Kenyan security forces”, the statement added.
The Kenyan government has vowed that it would not be intimidated. But al-Shabab also warned the public they would be targeted in “schools, universities, workplaces and even in your homes” because they had elected the government.
“Choices have consequences; you chose your government out of your own volition so endure the consequences of your actions, for you will bear the full brunt of its follies,” the statement read. “Not only are you condoning your government’s oppressive policies by failing to speak out against them, but are reinforcing their policies by electing them. You will, therefore, pay the price with your blood.”
Most of the victims of the terror attack died executionstyle as they lined up waiting for their turn to be shot, a senior Kenyan government source has told The Daily Telegraph.
Some students were killed as they spoke to their parents on the telephone, having been ordered to call with messages from the gunmen that their aim was to force Kenyan troops to leave Somalia, the source added. “This is the level of depravity that we are dealing with,” the source, who spoke anonymously, said. “These are not people who can be reasoned with, only force can stop them.”
The suicide vest-clad gunmen also told students they were “here to make your Easter holidays better” and warned of further attacks to come, survivors revealed. So far, 148 people have been confirmed dead and 79 injured. The death toll could climb higher still as piles of bodies are recounted.
Kenya’s interior minister confirmed the gunmen had been strapped with explosives and blew up “like bombs” as they were shot by an elite special forces squad.
At the gates of Garissa University, soldiers kept large crowds of sobbing relatives at bay. “I am so worried, I had a son who was among the students trapped inside the college, and since yesterday I have heard nothing,” said Habel Mutinda, an elderly man, his face streaming with tears.
Kenya’s government, which has faced criticism for its failure to act on intelligence to combat
Kenya hasn’t learnt anything at all in terms of how to respond to terror attacks
threats, said it would not be “intimidated or humiliated” by what happened.
Questions are now being asked about how the authorities reacted to intelligence that an attack was imminent, potentially on a university, and whether it has learned lessons from its haphazard response to the Westgate attack, in which 72 people died.
Peter Aling’o, senior researcher with the Institute for Security Studies in Nairobi, said al-Shabab was taking advantage of “gaps” in Kenya’s intelligence-led security planning.
“I think Kenya hasn’t learnt anything at all in terms of how to respond to terror attacks,” he said. “What we are seeing is a knee-jerk reaction that sends in security personnel in a manner that suggests they are not completely aware of what they are responding to.”
Some of those who escaped Thursday’s massacre said posters had been put up around campus and the university’s administrators warned about an imminent attack but they were “ignored” or dismissed as an April Fools’ prank.
Interior ministry spokesman Mwenda Njoka said five arrests had already been made, including three “coordinators” captured as they fled towards Somalia, and two others in the university.
Njoka said the two arrested on campus included a security guard at the university, and a Tanzanian named as Rashid Charles Mberesero, found “hiding in the ceiling” and holding grenades.
A R2.5-million bounty has also been offered for alleged alShabab commander Mohamed Mohamud, a former Kenyan teacher said to be the mastermind behind the Garissa attack.
President Uhuru Kenyatta said it was clear terrorist masterminds were operating inside Kenya and not just Somalia.
“The planners and financiers of this brutality are embedded in our communities,” he said, warning that “radicalisation is happening openly” in Islamic schools by “rogue” preachers.
Meanwhile, US President Barack Obama said he would go ahead with a trip to Kenya in the summer and promised to stand “hand-in-hand” with its government and people. “Words cannot adequately condemn the terrorist atrocities at Garissa,” he said on Friday. — © Comment on this: write to tellus@sundaytimes.co.za or SMS us at 33971 www.timeslive.co.za