Kenyan troops have crossed the border into war-torn Somalia to attack Islamist Shebab rebels they accuse of being behind several recent kidnappings of foreigners, Kenyan officials said Sunday.
“We have crossed into Somalia in pursuit of the Shehab, who are responsible for the kidnappings and attacks on our country,” government spokesman Alfred Matua said. Several witnesses reported heavy troop movement in Kenya’s border regions, with truckloads of soldier, large numbers of troops, as well as military planes and helicopters heading towards the frontier.
The assault comes a day after Kenya’s Internal Security Minister George Saitoti branded Somalia’s Al-Qaeda-inspired Shebab rebels “the enemy” and vowed to attack them “wherever they will be.” In just over the past month, a British woman and a French woman have been abducted from beach resorts in two separate incidents, dealing a major blow to Kenya’s tourism industry.
On Thursday, two female Spanish aid workers were seized by gunmen from the crowded Dadaab refugee camp, the world’s largest with some 450,000 mainly Somali refugees. Kenya already backs anti-Shebab and pro-government militia groups in Somali border regions as efforts to create a buffer zone from hostile rebels.