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Five more Kenyan police die in new landmine attack

Thursday May 25 2017
liboi

The police vehicle that ran over a landmine in Liboi, Garissa County, on May 25, 3017, killing two officers. PHOTO | COURTESY

Five Kenyan police officers died on Thursday morning after their vehicle ran over a landmine on the Malelei-Kulan road in Liboi, near the Somali border.

"The five police officers killed in the attack were headed to boost the ongoing operation in Liboi," said North Eastern Regional Coordinator Mohamud Ali Saleh.

Mr Saleh later told reporters that police had arrested several suspects and were following numerous leads to individuals behind the resurgence of landmine attacks in the region.

He said they had send contingents of security officers to pursue the assailants.

Unscrupulous businessmen

“They (Al-Shabaab) have been weakened by Amisom operations in Somalia and they are now running to Kenya … they are now planting explosives on isolated roads but we will destroy them,” he said.

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He linked the attacks to unscrupulous businessmen who deal with contraband goods from Somalia whom, he claimed, want to protect their businesses.

“They are against the government opening the border for cross border business,” he said. “We also suspect that local criminal elements might be assisting the militant whom we are going to arrest soon.”

Jihadists

The Shabaab, a Somali-led Al-Qaeda-linked jihadist group, claimed the attack — as well as the previous two — in a statement carried by the SITE Intelligence Group.

This brings to 14 the number of Kenyan security officials who have been killed by landmines in the past two days.

Nine officers died in two separate landmine attacks in Mandera and Garissa counties, both in Kenya's restive northeast close to the border with Somalia.

Five security officials in the Mandera incident were in a convoy escorting Governor Ali Roba to a political rally when they were killed by a roadside bomb.

In Garissa, four Administration Police officers died while two others suffered injuries when their vehicle hit a landmine near Kulan Dam in Liboi Wednesday morning. Three died on the spot while another succumbed as he was being taken to hospital.

Warning

The spate of bombings comes after Kenyan police warned of increased militant activity in the area.

The jihadist militants "are dispatching operatives into parts of north eastern region to lay IEDs (improvised explosive devices) along routes used by our security patrols in efforts to frustrate our security operations at the border areas," the police statement said.

Inspector-General of Police Joseph Boinnet warned that some members of the terrorist group had sneaked into the country and were planning attacks.

The Shabaab began attacking Kenya in 2011 after Nairobi ordered its troops into Somalia to fight the militants.

Kenyan soldiers are now part of a 22,000-strong African Union mission fighting in Somalia.

In a statement, IGP Boinnet said the terror group was behind a series of attacks, including a recent attack in Mandera where a chief was killed.

The IGP, however, said police were on high alert and asked the public to be vigilant and report on suspicious people.

The Shabaab is fighting to overthrow the internationally-backed government in Mogadishu.

-Additional reporting by AFP

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