US drone strike targets senior Shebab chief

Obama acknowledges civilian deaths Prayers and candlelight vigils held

WASHINGTON, April 2, (AFP): The United States has conducted another drone strike in Somalia, this time targeting a senior Shebab leader thought to have been plotting attacks against Americans in Mogadishu, the Pentagon said Friday.

The announcement came shortly before President Barack Obama offered detailed remarks about America’s controversial drone program, saying some criticism of it had been “legitimate,” and acknowledging there was “no doubt” the unmanned aircraft have killed innocent people in the past.

Thursday’s strike was conducted in cooperation with Somali officials and targeted Hassan Ali Dhoore, Pentagon press secretary Peter Cook said.

A US defense official, speaking on condition of anonymity, said the strike targeted a vehicle Dhoore was riding in with two other Al-Qaeda-aligned Shebab members.“We have been watching him off and on for a long time,” the official said.

The strike comes less than a month after US drones and warplanes hammered a Shebab training camp in Somalia, killing more than 150 fighters the Pentagon said were prepping for a “large-scale” attack.

Obama said the military avoids drone strikes in areas where women or children are present, and usually only carries out missions after long periods of monitoring.

Still, he said some strikes have killed people other than the intended targets.

“There has been, in the past, legitimate criticism that the architecture -- the legal architecture -- around the use of GARISSA, Kenya, April 2, (AFP): Kenyans on Saturday commemorated the first anniversary of a terrorist attack that killed 148 people, mostly students, at a university in Garissa in the country’s worst massacre since 1998.

Four gunmen from the Shebab, al-Qaeda’s East Africa branch, raided Garissa University College on April 2 last year, shooting students dead in their dormitories and then rounding up and executing scores more in a hall of residence.

It was the worst terrorist attack to hit Kenya since alQaeda bombed the US embassy in Nairobi in 1998, killing 213 people.

On Saturday, a group of some 100 people wearing T-shirts with peace slogans gathered in Garissa, 365 kms (225 miles) northeast of the capital Nairobi, to participate in a run in honour of the victims.

drone strikes or other kinetic strength was not as precise as it should have been, and there is no doubt that civilians were killed that should not have been,” Obama said at the end of a nuclear security summit in Washington.

“What I can say with great confidence is that our operating procedures are as rigorous as they have ever been and that

“We stand with the parents, we want to tell them that together as a country, from the north to the south, west to east, Muslims and Christians ... together we must fight terror,” said Garissa MP Aden Duale, who took part in the run.

Wheelchair-bound Farah Ali, a Garissa resident, pushed himself along the five-kilometre (three-mile) course to show “strength in solidarity” with the victims.

Other remembrance ceremonies were held in dozens of schools and universities across Kenya, including in the central town of Eldoret where hundreds of attack survivors relocated to continue their studies.

Garissa university reopened in January but few of the former students were willing to return.

Prayers and candlelight vigils were held later in the day in Garissa and Nairobi, led by government officials.

there is a constant evaluation of precisely what we do.”

The Pentagon said it was still assessing whether Dhoore had been killed.

Dhoore allegedly was part of Shebab’s security and intelligence wing, and had been involved in planning attacks in Mogadishu, the Pentagon said. Participants, including local MP, Aden Duale (front center), take the start of the inaugural Garissa marathon on April 2 in Garissa, in memory of the massacre of 148 mostly students of Garissa University College a year ago. Kenyans commemorates the first anniversary of a terrorist attack that killed 148 people, mostly students, at a university in Garissa in the country’s worst massacre since 1998. (AFP)