Kenya told to seal off border
2007-01-02 09:13
Baidoa - Somalia's government on Monday appealed to Kenya to close its border to prevent Islamists who have fled their last bastion in Kismayo from crossing the Kenyan eastern frontier with the lawless nation.
"We have appealed to the Kenyan government to seal its borders because we have received information that these Islamists and foreign fighters are headed to the border," said information minister Ali Jama.
"It is for the interest of Kenya that these people do not enter into the country ... they are dangerous people," he added.
In Nairobi, Kenyan officials said they had not received orders to close the borders, but had reinforced ground and aerial patrols, mainly covering the Ras Kamboni area, a border forest near the Indian Ocean.
Security boosted on the border
The Islamists on Monday abandoned the southern Somali port town of Kismayo, about 500km south of the capital Mogadishu, faced with an advance by Ethiopian troops and government fighters who have routed them from other towns in battles since December 20.
"We have boosted security on the border to ensure that those sheikhs do not enter the country," a senior police official in northern Kenya, said Johnstone Limo.
"We suspect that they are headed to Ras Kamboni, but we have sent enough air and ground patrols in the area to ensure that nobody sneaks through."
"We take matters of security seriously and we have done all that was needed," Limo added, but he explained that actually sealing off the border was a matter for the Nairobi government.
"Closing the border is a policy matter ... We have not received orders on the same," he said.