5 Civilians Killed, Some Beheaded In Eastern Kenya’s Shebab Attack

KENYA – Five (5) civilians were reportedly killed and some beheaded in an attack on Saturday evening in two villages in eastern Kenya claimed by the radical Islamist Shebab, police and local sources said on Sunday.

The attack was carried out at around 19:30 (16:30 GMT) on Saturday in the villages of Juhudi and Salama, located in the coastal county of Lamu, which borders Somalia, according to these sources.

“Five people were killed. The victims’ throats were slit and others were beheaded,” a police source told AFP.

“They (the assailants) were armed with machetes and some had firearms, but they did not shoot at them. The victims’ throats were slit and others were decapitated”, added this source.

A resident of one of the villages, Hassan Abdul, said that “the women were locked in the houses and the men were ordered to come out, they were tied up with ropes and massacred”.

“In total, five people were killed, including a secondary school pupil. (…) All those killed had their throats slit and some were beheaded”, he added, claiming to have counted between 20 and 30 assailants.

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According to another resident, Ismail Hussein, the attackers also seized goods belonging to the residents, in particular foodstuffs, before fleeing by firing into the air.

The Lamu County Prefect, Louis Rono, confirmed the attack but did not give a death toll. “We have increased security in the area following last night’s attack,” he said on Sunday.

The Shebab, a group affiliated to al-Qaeda, claimed in a statement to have carried out an operation on the village of Juhudi, saying they had killed “six members of the Kenyan infidels” and “burnt down ten houses where Christians were living”.

According to gathering, for more than 15 years, the Shebab have been fighting the federal Somali government, backed by the international community, to establish Islamic law in this country in the Horn of Africa.