Somali militants accept amnesty
2011-11-13 12:33
Nairobi - More than 30 Kenya-based members of Somalia's top militant group have accepted a police amnesty and are providing information to help Kenyan police secure the country against threatened suicide attacks by the group, a Kenyan official said.
Police spokesperson Eric Kiraithe said on Saturday that some of the men are Kenyan citizens. He said others are refugees from neighbouring Somalia, where the al-Qaeda-linked al-Shabab militant group is based.
"I can assure you a lot of young men from this country and also from Somalia are working with us now to secure this country and we believe that basically internally al-Shabab is losing its foothold at a very fast rate," Kiraithe said.
Kenyan troops last month moved into southern Somalia in pursuit of al-Shabab militants in response to a string of attacks and kidnappings in Kenya, including those of four European tourists. Al-Shabab threatened to retaliate with large-scale terror attacks in Nairobi, Kenya's capital.
Police blame al-Shabab for recent attacks that have killed seven people in Kenya in the past few weeks.
Kenyan police commissioner Mathew Iteere extended amnesty to Kenyans recruited by al-Shabab following twin grenade attacks on the capital late last month. A non-Somali Kenyan was convicted to life in prison for one of the grenade attacks at a city bus stop, which killed one person.
Elgiva Bwire Oliacha, 28, was sentenced to life in prison after he pleaded guilty to several charges, including being a member of al-Shabab.
A July a UN report warned that al-Shabab was recruiting non-Somali members from countries in East Africa and was giving a rise to a new generation of East African jihadists. The groups represent a new security challenge for the region and wider international community, the report said.
The report, by a panel of UN experts monitoring arms embargoes against Somalia and Eritrea, said that in the past al-Shabab's presence in Kenya was concentrated primarily within the ethnic Somali community.
- SAPA