Tragedy has struck Kenya as news of a brutal shopping mall massacre has rolled in overnight.
Armed men from the Al-Qaeda linked Somali terrorist organisation Al Shabaab descended the Westgate shopping complex in the Nairobi capital on Saturday afternoon, with current reports stating 39 people have been killed and 150 more have been injured. Al Shabaab confirmed their involvement behind the attacks via twitter; their account has since been suspended.
According to the ABC, the attack was, “retribution for Kenya’s operations against the group in Somalia.”
Chilling accounts from the attack have described that the group were targeting non-muslims; according to the Sydney Morning Herald, the gunmen wore AK-47s and vests, threw grenades and advised muslims that they were able to go free. A British soldier on the scene described the chaos, “I personally touched the eyes of four people and they were dead. One of them was a child,” he said. “It’s carnage up there.”
The Westgate attack is the most fatal incident in Kenya since the 1998 US embassy bombing in Nairobi which killed over 200 people. According to the ABC, the US has reported some of its citizens among the 150 injured; France has reported two of its citizens’ deaths in relation to the attack, one New Zealander has been injured; no Australians have been reported injured. According to the Kenyan Red Cross, an undetermined number of hostages are still being held hostage in the shopping mall, with casualties expected to climb bast the current count of 39.
President Hassan Sheikh Mohamud commented on the tragedy, “these heartless acts against defenceless civilians, including innocent children, are beyond the pale and cannot be tolerated. We stand shoulder to shoulder with Kenya in its time of grief for these lives lost and the many injured.”
More news on the Westgate incident as it comes.
Title image by Simon Maina via Getty.
