All gunmen killed at hotel complex, says president
KENYA’S security forces have killed the Islamist extremist gunmen whose assault on a luxury hotel and shopping complex took 14 “innocent lives”, the country’s president said yesterday.
“All the terrorists have been eliminated,” President Uhuru Kenyatta said in announcing an end to the operation to secure the complex in the capital, Nairobi.
In a televised address, he did not say how many attackers were involved.
He said more than 700 people were evacuated during the security operation and he urged Kenyans to “go back to work without fear”, saying the east African country was safe.
In the hours before Kenyatta spoke, sporadic gunfire could be heard from the scene after scores of people were rescued at daybreak during what police called a “mopping-up” exercise.
Surveillance videos showed that the attack involved at least four armed men.
Al-Shabaab – the extremist group allied to al-Qaeda and based in neighbouring Somalia – claimed responsibility for the carnage at the DusitD2 hotel complex, which includes bars, restaurants, offices and banks, and is in Nairobi’s well-to-do Westlands neighbourhood, where many foreign expatriates reside.
Al-Shabaab carried out the 2013 attack at the nearby Westgate Mall in Nairobi that killed 67 people.
The US State Department confirmed that an American citizen was among those killed, but did not release the victim’s identity.
The British high commissioner in Kenya said at least one British national had been killed, without giving details.
The authorities had sent special forces into the hotel to flush out the gunmen.
At dawn, another explosion and more gunfire was heard. Scores of people were rushed to safety in the early morning hours. |