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Al-Shabab militants behead 9 civilians in southeastern Kenya

Saturday, 08 July 2017 2:10 PM [ Last Update: Saturday, 08 July 2017 2:11 PM ]

The file photo taken on February 17, 2011, shows members of Somalia’s al-Qaeda-linked al-Shabab militant group at a village in Lower Shabelle region, in the country’s south. (Photo by AFP)

Suspected Takfiri al-Shabab terrorists have decapitated at least nine people in an attack on a pair of villages in southeastern Kenya, near the border with restive Somalia.

The deadly attack was carried out overnight on Saturday, when some 15 suspected al-Qaeda-linked militants stormed the two neighboring villages of Jima and Poromoko in the Kenyan coastal district of Lamu, near the Somali border, gathering their civilian victims together before beheading them, Kenyan local police and officials said.

A senior police officer at police headquarters in the capital Nairobi, speaking on the condition of anonymity, also confirmed the brutal incident. "It is true, we have lost nine people in today's attack," he said, without providing further details.

According to villagers, most of the heavily armed assailants appeared to be ethnic Somalis. The victims “were slaughtered like chickens”, said a villager, who witnessed the incident.

Residents of the two villages had called the police a day earlier, reporting the presence of al-Shabab militants in the area, but no police forces were apparently deployed in the area to boost security.

The Somalia-based terror group has for years conducted deadly cross-border attacks in Kenya but it has rarely decapitated the victims.

The Saturday attack was carried out in the vicinity of Pandanguo village, where terrorists killed three police officers in an attack on a police post in Lamu on Friday.

The al-Shabab group has vowed retribution on Kenya for deploying troops in 2011 to Somalia to help its fragile central government curb the terror group, which last year became the deadliest terrorist organization in Africa.

In recent months, the terror group has increased attacks, using homemade explosive devices, killing at least 46 people in Lamu and Mandera districts.

The increase in attacks can pose a security threat against Kenya’s August 8 presidential election.

In Somalia, al-Shabab militants have been pushed out of all major urban strongholds and ports, but they continue to stage attacks on targets in smaller, more remote areas.

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