Kenya: No al-Qaeda link 'so far'
2002-11-30 19:48
Mombasa - Kenya said on Saturday it had so far found no link between 12 people held over Thursday's attacks on Israelis in Mombasa and the al-Qaeda network, and authorities freed the two Westerners among the detainees.
As police hunted for clues in the suicide bombing of the Israeli-owned Paradise Hotel, where 16 people including three attackers died, a Kenyan government minister appealed to people in this mainly Muslim city to help without fear of persecution.
"This is not a witch-hunt. We want to get only the culprits and punish them," Katana Ngala told a memorial service held amid the wreckage of the hotel.
US officials have said the top suspect for the blast is the Somali-based group Al-Itihad al-Islamiya, known also as AIAI or the Islamic Union.
They said it had links with Osama bin Laden's al-Qaeda, target of US President George W Bush's war on terror after the September 11 attacks on New York and Washington last year.
The interim government in lawless Somalia declined comment on Saturday on the US charge, but called for the dismantling of "terror groups" throughout East Africa. A leading Somali cleric, however, said such violence was the result of what he called oppression.
Kenyan Internal Security Minister Julius Sunkuli, asked if police had found any connection between al-Qaeda and those being held over the explosion and a failed simultaneous attempt to shoot down an Israeli airliner, told reporters: "None so far."
Police later released American Alicia Kalhammer and her Spanish husband Jose Tena after questioning, saying they had no connection with the attacks. The two said they bore no grudge and would continue their holiday elsewhere in Kenya.
"There are no hard feelings. We love Kenya. We love the Kenyan people and we know they were doing their job," Kalhammer (31) said.
Tena (26) said they had attempted to leave their Mombasa hotel for a safer place in Kenya shortly after hearing about the blast, only to be detained by police.
The other detainees are six Pakistanis and four Somalis who were arrested for entering Kenya illegally and only later came under suspicion by those investigating the attacks, police said.
Hotal staff weep
Friday's US comments were the first from Washington to point a finger at al-Qaeda and the Somali group since suicide bombers rammed an explosives-laden vehicle into the beach hotel and missiles nearly hit an Israeli airliner carrying 261 people.
But US officials stressed it was too early to be sure who was responsible. "The pattern could fit al-Qaeda," one said.
Al-Qaeda is widely accused of the 1998 bombings of US embassies in Kenya and Tanzania in which 224 people died, most of them Africans.
At the Mombasa bomb site, hotel staff wiped away tears as they picked through charred rubble, searching for any items of clothing or mementos belonging to friends killed in the blast. One shook ash off what looked like part of a pair of trousers.
Police guarded the cluster of thatched-roof buildings that made up the hotel, more than half of them smashed apart by the blast. Black ash from burnt buildings speckled the white sands of the resort's beach.
Minister Ngala told the memorial service, attended by both Muslim and Christian religious leaders, that the government was stepping up its search for the perpetrators of the attacks.
"When we ask for information, please volunteer it and help us to ensure security. Do not turn away when we ask for your urgent help," said Ngala, minister for lands and settlement.
But Sheikh Ali Shee, chairman of the Council of Imams and Preachers of Kenya, said many Muslims in Mombasa would be reluctant to help investigators from the United States, perceived by many in the city to be biased towards Israel.
Nevertheless, the Supreme Council of Kenya Muslims condemned the attacks and said those behind them were enemies of Islam.
Somalia condemns attacks
An official of Somalia's Transitional National Government (TNG) said Prime Minister Hassan Abshir Farah also condemned the attacks "in the strongest terms".
"The government feels it is time to work together as a region and international community to dismantle terror groups wherever they are," the official quoted Farah as saying.
The TNG denies charges by some of its Somali warlord opponents and by the government of neighbouring Ethiopia that it harbours Al-Itihad members suspected of involvement in violence.
Sheikh Ali Sheikh Mahmud, a Somali cleric who has denied allegations that he is a leading member of Al-Itihad, said: "I am very sorry about what happened in Mombasa but this kind of thing will not cease until some parts of the international community stop ignoring the rights of oppressed people."
The previously unheard of "Army of Palestine" has claimed responsibility for Thursday's attacks in a faxed statement via a Lebanese media organisation. There has been no confirmation.
The suicide bombers smashed a Pajero four-wheel-drive vehicle into the lobby of the Paradise Hotel and blew it up, killing 13 people - three of them Israelis - and wounding scores. Minutes earlier missiles were fired at the Israeli plane taking off nearby and packed with Israeli tourists.
Victims included Kenyan dancers who had been welcoming tourists in the hotel lobby when the bomb went off.
An Israeli air force plane flew Israeli survivors home on Friday, along with the bodies of the three dead Israelis.