KENYA: Investigations underway into Kenya mall attack - Interior Minister

Record ID: 353946

  • Title: KENYA: Investigations underway into Kenya mall attack - Interior Minister
  • Date: 21st September 2013
  • Summary: NAIROBI, KENYA (SEPTEMBER 21, 2013) (REUTERS) VARIOUS OF PEOPLE RUNNING OUT OF MALL / AMBULANCE AT SCENE
  • Embargoed: 6th October 2013 13:00
  • Keywords:
  • Location: Kenya
  • Country: Kenya
  • Topics: General
  • Reuters ID: LVA4B2ROLB28SRJNAR7PLM5NT75E
  • Story Text: Militant gunmen stormed a shopping mall in Nairobi on Saturday (september 21) killing at least 25 people, including children, and sending scores fleeing in panic from shops and restaurants onto the streets, according to witnesses and the Red Cross.
    Shooting continued hours after the initial assault as troops surrounded the Westgate mall and police and soldiers combed the building, hunting down the attackers shop by shop.
    A police officer inside the building said the gunmen were barricaded inside the Nakumatt supermarket, one of Kenya's biggest chains.
    Some local television stations reported hostages had been taken, but there was no official confirmation.
    Kenya's cabinet secretary for interior and co-ordination of national government Joseph Ole Lenku told journalists at the scene the situation was under control of and investigations were underway. He put the death toll at 11.
    "We are yet to establish who caused the attack and we don't want to speculate for now who made the attacks. Investigations are already going on and in due course we will know who the perpetrators of the violence," Ole Lenku said.
    The Westgate mall attack was the single biggest since al Qaeda's east Africa cell bombed the U.S. embassy in Nairobi, in 1998 killing more than 200 people. In 2002, the same militant cell attacked an Israeli-owned hotel and tried to shoot down an Israeli jet in a co-ordinated attack.
    The Somali militant group al Shabaab, which Kenya blames for shootings, bombings and grenade attacks against churches and the security forces, said Kenyan authorities "turned a deaf ear" to its repeated warnings but did not claim responsibility for the shooting.
    The group's Twitter account later said they had been in contact with "mujahideen" gunmen inside the Nairobi mall.
    One eyewitness who identified himself as Abdulaziz said he saw an "Arab" who he suspected as one of the gunmen and alerted police.
    "I saw an Arab guy, a strong guy, an Arab, not a Somali guy, an Arab guy and he was holding a gun and everything, so I was just running for my life. And suddenly, in the first floor, I went to a shop, a shoe shop in the stores and I saw this Arab guy changing his clothes and after changing his clothes, he was hiding around there, so when we were rescued, he came out with us," he said.
    Meanwhile, Kenyan security forces said they had arrested one of the gunmen who took part in the attack , the Kenyan Presidency said on Twitter.
    In a separate tweet, the east African country's head of police, David Kimaiyo, said several other assailants had been pinned down after soldiers and police moved into the mall to hunt down the attackers.
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