Somalia’s al-Shabaab pledge terror campaign against Kenya

 

 

Are Kenyan security forces ready to face more terror threats from Somalia's al-Shabaab. (File photo: AFP)

 

(Al Arabiya) Somalia’s Islamist group al-Shabaab threatened on Wednesday to increase militant action in Kenya, after the country refused to withdraw its troops from Somalia, reported Agence France-Presse.

The al-Qaeda linked al-Shabaab claimed responsibility for last week’s attack on Nairobi’s Westgate shopping mall, in which at least 67 people died, with 39 more listed as missing by the Red Cross.

“We will strike Kenyans where it hurts the most, turn their cities into graveyards and rivers of blood will flow in Nairobi,” al-Shabaab said in a recent statement.

“The Kenyan government’s decision to keep its invading force in Somalia is an indication that they haven’t yet learnt any valuable lessons from the Westgate attacks,” the extremists added, warning that Kenya was
“inviting unprecedented levels of insecurity, bloodshed and destruction.”

Kenya’s President Uhuru Kenyatta on Tuesday said troops had been sent to Somalia to restore order to their neighbor and would remain there until this was achieved.

“We will not be intimated, we will not be cowed,” Kenyatta said. “We will stay there until they bring order to their nation.”

In reaction to Kenyan Defense Force’s (KDF) decision, al-Shabaab said it was “fully determined to intensify attacks inside Kenya until the last KDF boots exit Somali soil,” saying it had the “right to defend our land and our people from enemy aggression.”

(With AFP)