Friday, January 11, 2013
GARISSA, Kenya, Jan. 11 — Kenya’s security officers on Friday arrested two key terror suspects at the sprawling Ifo refugee camp in Dadaab in northern Kenya.
Garissa County Commissioner Mohamed Maalim confirmed the arrest, saying the authorities believe the two key terror suspects are involved in the illegal business of buying and selling of fire arms and ammunitions in the region.
“The two had just finished doing their business at around 10:50 a.m. (0750GMT) in the but thanks to the quick response of a good Samaritan who saw them counting the ammunitions who alerted the police who then went quickly and arrested them,” Maalim told Xinhua.
Maalim said during the arrest, 240 rounds of ammunitions at the Ifo Refugee Camp market as they stopped to buy miraa (khat) at a local kiosk.
Sources within the police force said that the suspects were refugees from the Daadab refugee complex which has experienced a series of attacks in the past few months.
The East African nation shares porous border with Somalia which makes it hard to thwart potential terrorists, particularly Al- Shabaab militants, from crossing over to target innocent Kenyans.
The two who were identified as Ibrahim Samow, from Tana River county and Aden Hussein – a Kenyan of Somali origin, according to Maalim, are behind the illegal business of smuggling firearms from Somalia to northeastern region and the neighbouring Tana Delta that has in the recent months been hit by violence.
“We have every reason to believe that the two were working closely to cause insecurity in our region. We believe they have a hand in the supply of fire arm and ammunitions that are also being used to kill people in Tana Delta, this is because one of them is from the area,” said Maalim when contacted on phone by Xinhua.
He said the two had already been handed to the police investigators for further interrogation adding that they expected more information “to come out from the two”.
The two are currently being held at the Dadaab police station. This comes even as residents of Garissa town that has been worst affected by insecurity in the recent months continue leaving in fear fearing more attacks.
On Wednesday, police officers on a patrol at the Garissa town were attacked by grenade and guns by people believed to be Al- Shabaab, killing a civilian and injuring seven police officers.
Police are yet to make any arrest in connection to the incident and the many others that have occurred before.
Northeastern province has bore the brunt of insecurity since Kenya took its troops to Somalia to fight the Al-Shabaab group.
Two days ago, unknown assailants struck Mandera border town in another daring attack that targeted an international aid agency operating from the area.
The militants who security intelligence believe have a link to the weakened Somali Islamist group Al-Shabaab carried out a twin hand grenades attacks on World Food Programme (WFP) offices. Nobody was injured in the incident.