Former Kenyan presidential candidate, Ole Kiyiapi, announced in a BBC interview the death of his brother, a member of the Kenyan Defensive Forces (KDF) in an al-Shabaab raid. The professor said he was deeply saddened that there had been no official statement and, consequently, no deserved recognition of the victims. Reports of the attack appeared in the Somali media and linked the incident to the work of the Somali jihadist group, formally linked to al-Qaeda.
The region on the Somali-Kenyan border is no stranger to attacks by the group, and the previous week there had been a raid by the jihadists on a construction site run by the China Communications Construction Company Limited (CCCC), a Chinese company that was working on the LAPSSET, the transport corridor that will link Kenya with South Sudan and Ethiopia. As reported by Nation.Africa newspaper, local reports say the army’s response was not long in coming, with trucks of soldiers heading towards the scene of the attack.
As mentioned earlier, the area has been the scene of numerous clashes between the army and terrorists, with a crescendo in recent months. The same Chinese company was the victim of an attack on 23 January, when machinery was burned.
In recent weeks, however, the army’s clashes with al-Shabaab have intensified. This week, an al-Shabaab member fell victim to a clash with the KDF, again in the Boni forest. Two weeks ago, the army surprised and killed four militants of the Somali group as they attempted to cross the border.
