Inter-clan violence killed 55
2005-07-13 09:32
Marsabit - Police said on Wednesday 55 people, mostly women and children, were killed and hundreds wounded in an attack on remote village in northeast Kenya believed to be the country's worst-ever single episode of inter-clan violence.
Residents of the area around Turbi village, about 580km northeast of the capital, said the toll could be much higher but police in the region said they could confirm only the deaths of 45 victims and 10 raiders.
"It was a deadly attack that led to the death of 45 people and ten bandits," said Robert Kipkemoi Kitur, the assistant commissioner of police in Kenya's Eastern Province where the raid took place.
Many people in hospital
At least 18 people were admitted in Marsabit district hospital, an ill-equipped facility in this nearest town to Turbi about 150km south, most of them in critical condition, officials said.
"Twelve of them are children, three women and three men," Kitur said, figures confirmed by doctors.
Officials said a combined Kenyan police and military team, backed by three helicopters, were pursuing the raiders near the Kenya-Ethiopia border after Tuesday's attack on two residential compounds and a school in Turbi.
"We are in hot pursuit," Kitur said. "Currently, our teams have recovered 50 000 goats and sheep, 10 heads of cattle, 10 camels and four donkeys."
"Our ground forces are being assisted by aerial surveillance team," said national police spokesperson Jaspher Ombati in Nairobi.
Officials said hundreds of villagers, mostly children, had gunshot wounds during the raid that terrified residents said was an attack by the Borana clan against the rival Gabra clan spurred by long-running disputes over water and pasture.
Grim scene
Witnesses said dead bloodied bodies and bullet casings littered the ground around traditional hut compounds known as manyatta, a trading centre and nearby primary school, where the Borana hit early on Tuesday.
"It seems they were taken without warning," said Roba Elema, a police reservist, who was the first at the scene of attack. "I believe the death toll could be much higher than what is being confirmed now."
Survivors at the hospital said the attackers were armed with AK-47 rifles, grenades, bows and arrows and machetes.
They said home guards in Turbi trading post were overpowered by the raiders, who numbered between 200 and 500, and police took time to respond to the attack.
Interclan rivalry in the sparsely-populated region has been rife for decades, sparking attacks and counter-attacks, notably over access to rare pasture and water.