AFRICA: KENYA: AID WORKERS KIDNAPPED BY GUNMAN

CISA report -Two Spaniards were on Thursday October 13 kidnapped by al Shabaab gunmen at the Dadaab refugee camp in Garissa.

The victims were relief workers with Médecins Sans Frontières, Doctors Without Borders.

Emergency response teams comprising the police and the military were airborne minutes after the incident at Dadaab Ifo camp was reported.

According to The Nation there has been no indication that the Kenyan forces have tracked down the kidnappers.

This marks an escalation of cross-border raids by the Islamic militants who have so far abducted two tourists and killed another in Lamu.

On Thursday, they struck at midday in a raid that took about 40 minutes. Officers aboard military and police helicopters complained of poor visibility because it was raining heavily.

Kenyan Police spokesman Eric Kiraithe said: “We’ve dispatched a helicopter. Another helicopter from the military is also involved.

‘‘They have reported that manoeuvring is difficult because of bad weather but the operation is under way.”

A witness told The Nation by phone from Dadaab that the victims were doctors and were being driven home from work.

“The attackers, who were armed with AK-47 rifles waited for them outside. As soon as the vehicle carrying them left the gate, they blocked it, shot the driver and abducted the two foreigners to an unknown destination,” the witness, a Kenyan worker at the camp, said.

He added: “The attackers were among the refugees who have stayed here for some time. It is difficult to know when they came because we have new arrivals every day.”

He believes there are many more al Shabaab fighters in the camp pretending to be refugees.

Thursday’s incident was the third in two months, in which foreigners were abducted by gunmen and taken to lawless Somalia.

French woman Marieu Dedieu was kidnapped on Manda Island on October 1 while Mrs Judith Tebbutt, a Briton, was abducted and her husband David shot dead at Kiwayu resort in Kiunga in September.

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