Kenyan University Attacked by Al Shabaab

Kenyan University Attacked by Al Shabaab

 By Jeremy Reynalds, Senior Correspondent, ASSIST News Service (jeremyreynalds@gmail.com)  

 

KENYA  (ANS. APRIL 2, 2015) Al Shabaab, the Somali-based Islamist terror group, attacked Garissa University in north-east Kenya on April 2. So far at least 147 people are reported to have been killed and 79 injured in the  attack. 

 

The four attackers were killed. 

 

According to a news release from Christian Solidarity Worldwide (CSW), local reports indicate that the militants launched the attack at 5.30 a.m. by throwing explosives at the university's main gate before storming the facility, firing indiscriminately and gaining access to the student hostels. 

 

According to several reports, the assailants separated the students based on their religion and allegedly released Muslim students, while killing several non-Muslims on the spot and taking others as hostages. 

 

A BBC story reported that UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon condemned the attack, and said the UN was ready to help Kenya “prevent and counter terrorism and violent extremism.”

 

The United States said it was offering Nairobi assistance to take on Al Shabaab and would continue to work with others in the region to take on the group.

 

The Kenyan government has named Mohamed Kuno, a high-ranking Al Shabaab official, as the mastermind of the attack.

 

A BBC Somali Service reporter said Kuno was headmaster at an Islamic school in Garissa before he quit in 2007.

 

The BBC said Kenyan President Uhuru Kenyatta offered his condolences to families of the victims and ordered “urgent steps,” to ensure police recruits could begin training immediately. 

 

“We have suffered unnecessarily due to shortage of security personnel,” he said.

 

Mervyn Thomas, Chief Executive of Christian Solidarity Worldwide said in the news release, “We extend our deepest condolences to the families of those killed and injured in this attack, and we pray for the safe return for the students who are still unaccounted for. CSW deplores this cowardly attack on civilians. The separation of hostages according to their faith echoes previous Al Shabaab attacks and highlights the group's deadly and divisive sectarian motivations. This is particularly poignant coming on the eve of the Christian celebration of Easter.” 

 

CSW said that Al Shabaab attacks in Kenya have increased since Oct. 2011, when Kenya's army joined international efforts to stabilize Somalia following the cross-border abductions of foreign tourists by the group. It formally aligned itself with al Qaeda in 2012, although reports of foreign fighters amongst its ranks predated this announcement. 

 

There have been three attacks in the last two years in which the group has separated hostages according to religious identity and murdered them accordingly. They were the siege at Westgate Shopping Mall in Sept. 2013, the hijacking of a bus traveling from Mandera to Nairobi in Nov. 2014, and the attack on a quarry in Mandera in Dec. 2014.

 

The attack on Garissa University comes as the terror alert in East Africa was raised by the US, UK and Australian governments. 

 

Christian Solidarity Worldwide works for religious freedom through advocacy and human rights, in the pursuit of justice.

 

For further information, visit www.csw.org.uk

 

** You can republish this or any of stories with full attribution to the ASSIST News Service (www.assistnews.net)