Kenyan teen shot during virus curfew

NAIROBI: Kenyan police have ordered a probe into the shooting of a 13-year-old boy on his balcony in Nairobi as officers allegedly opened fire to enforce a nighttime curfew.

Residents of the slum where the shooting took place said that a confrontation broke out shortly before 7pm on Monday as police started forcing people into their homes for the start of the curfew, imposed to curb the spread of Covid-19.

The victim’s father Hussein Moyo said that his wife and children had been standing on the balcony watching the chaos when his son Yasin was shot, adding the bullet had “ripped through his intestines”.

“This operation was planned in the wrong way. The police arrive yelling and when people see that they run scared. They beat and rob people, they also throw teargas into our homes,” said Mr Moyo at his son’s funeral, which was attended by several hundred local people.

“During the day we are fighting coronavirus, and yet we have to deal with bullets during the night.”

A police statement said that Inspector General of Police Hillary Mutyambai had ordered a probe “into the death of a thirteen-year-old boy who was hit by a stray bullet”.

The Independent Policing Oversight Authority issued a statement condemning the incident, and said it had launched an investigation.

“They [police] were violent, they started beating people and then we heard gunshots,” said Mercy Ngaira, a resident in the Mathare settlement.

Kenya’s police force is often accused by rights groups of using excessive force and carrying out unlawful killings, especially in poor neighbourhoods.

In January, Human Rights Watch said at least eight young men had been shot in three low-income neighbourhoods since Christmas, and a 2019 report detailed the killings of 21 young men and boys by police “apparently with no justification”.