Al-Shabaab claims it was gassed

Series of explosions ends four-day assault

NAIROBI, KENYA: The militant group behind the four-day takeover of a Nairobi mall claimed yesterday that Kenyan government forces used chemical weapons in their assault on the building, then carried out ‘‘a demolition’’ to cover evidence and buried 137 hostages.

In a series of Twitter posts from an account believed to be genuine, alShabaab said that ‘‘having failed to defeat the mujahideen inside the mall, the Kenyan govt disseminated chemical gases to end the siege’’.

They added ‘‘to cover their crime, the Kenyan govt carried out a demolition to the building, burying evidence and all hostages under the rubble’’.

Government spokesman Manoah Esipisu immediately denied the claim, saying no chemical weapons were used and that the official civilian death toll remains at 61.

‘‘Al-Shabaab is known for wild allegations and there is absolutely no truth to what they’re saying,’’ he said.

Mr Esipisu said floors of the building collapsed after a fire started by al-Shabaab attackers caused structural weakness in a third floor car park, which then came down onto the 2nd floor and brought it down onto the first, or ground floor.

He said there were known to be eight civilians in the rubble, which were included in the government’s official death estimate. There could be several terrorists also buried, he said.

At the mall yesterday morning, gunshots could be heard. Mr Esipisu said the shots came from Kenyan forces going room to room in the large Westgate Mall, firing protectively before entering unknown territory.

President Uhuru Kenyatta said the night before the terrorists had been defeated and declared three days of national mourning beginning yesterday.

Nairobi said forensic experts from the United States, Britain and Israel would be assisting them in their investigation of the attack. ‘‘The mall is sealed off. It is a crime scene,’’ Mr Esipisu said.

NAIROBI: Bomb disposal experts and investigators searched through the wreckage of a Kenyan shopping mall yesterday after a four-day attack by Islamist militants that killed at least 72 people.

President Uhuru Kenyatta declared three days of mourning after troops defeated the al-Qaeda-linked alShabaab group that targeted the upscale shopping centre popular with prosperous Kenyans and foreigners.

The militants stormed the mall, known for its Western shops selling iPads and Nike shoes, in a hail of gunfire and grenades at lunchtime on Saturday. The attack ended on Tuesday when Kenyan troops set off a series of explosions inside the building.

Mr Kenyatta said five militants and six security personnel were killed and 61 civilians had so far been confirmed dead but an unknown number of corpses are buried under the masonry.

Three floors collapsed after the blasts and a separate fire weakened the structure of the vaulted, marble-tiled building. Officials said the blaze was due to militants lighting mattresses as a decoy.

‘‘Forensic investigators are on the site now,’’ said a senior official from the National Disaster Operations Centre (NDOC), speaking near the mall and adding that foreign agents were on the scene. He did not identify the agents.

Al-Shabab, which said it launched the assault to demand Kenya withdraw its troops fighting with African peacekeepers in Somalia, said hostages were killed when Kenyan troops used gas to clear the mall. Officials dismissed this as ‘‘propaganda’’.

Mr Kenyatta has said Kenyan forces would not quit Somalia. ‘‘We have ashamed and defeated our attackers,’’ he said in a televised address on Tuesday.

Israel has sent advisers to help the search, according to an Israeli source. The United States also has Federal Bureau of Investigation personnel on the ground. Others countries including Britain have offered help. Several foreigners have been listed among the dead.

The attack has highlighted the reach of the Somali group and the capabilities of its crack unit believed to be behind the attack, confirming Western and regional fears that as long as Somalia remains in turmoil it will be a recruiting and training ground for militant Islam.

‘‘The bodies are still lying there in the rubble. We don’t know how many exactly,’’ said the NDOC official.

‘‘The investigators will be looking to see what information they can extract to identify the terrorists and their nationalities, including DNA tests,’’ he said, after Kenyan officials said the attack was a ‘‘multinational’’ operation.

Eleven people suspected of involvement with the well-planned assault were in custody but he did not say how many, if any, were gunmen taken alive and how many may have been people arrested elsewhere.

A British citizen of Somali origin was detained at Nairobi airport, a Kenyan security source said. A British newspaper said he was a 35-year-old, trying to leave on Turkish Airlines.

It was unclear whether intelligence reports of American or British gunmen would be confirmed. Al-Shabab denied that any women took part, after British sources said the fugitive widow of one of the 2005 London suicide bombers might have some role.

Smoke still rose into the damp air yesterday morning above the Israeli-built mall that had been a symbol of Africa’s economic rise that has drawn in foreign investors.

Faster growth has also created wider wealth gaps, adding to grievances tapped by several violent Islamist groups from Mali to Algeria and Nigeria to Kenya. All have espoused an antiWestern, anti-Christian creed.

US President Barack Obama, whose father was Kenyan, said he believed the country — scene of one of alQaeda’s first big attacks in 1998, when a bomb devastated the US embassy in Nairobi — would continue to be a regional pillar of stability.

Al-Shabab, which taunted Kenya when militants were battling inside the mall, said action by Kenyan troops using gas were responsible for the ‘‘lives of the 137 hostages who were being held by the mujahideen [fighters]’’.

‘‘After four days of exposing the vulnerability of their nation, the Kenyan govt ended the siege in a morally reprehensible manner,’’ the group said on its Twitter account.

Al-Shabab had threatened revenge since Kenyan troops joined the war against Islamists in its northern neighbour two years ago.