GARISSA, Kenya, Apr 2 – At least 70 students were killed in Thursay morning’s terror attack on Garissa University College, a number Interior Cabinet Secretary Joseph Nkaissery described as a “high human cost.”
Nkaissery on Thursday evening said the number could still rise given the gunmen still held more students hostage 14 hours after the attack began. “The (hostel) block which the terrorists captured normally houses about 360 students but a few of them have managed to escape. Those ones we say have injures so we still hope majority of students are holed up in their cubicles and so we hope for the best.”
He, however, led with the report that 500 out of an approximate total of 815 students had been moved to safety and that ninety-percent of the threat has been eliminated.
Seventy-nine, he said, were injured in the attack and were being attended to at the Garissa Level 5 Hospital with a number flown to Nairobi for specialised treatment.
Nkaissery said it was unclear how many gunmen were involved in the attack but the Interior Ministry had announced that four were killed and one person arrested on suspicion of involvement.
Nkaissery said it was unclear how many gunmen were involved in the attack but the Interior Ministry had announced that four were killed and one person arrested on suspicion of involvement.
On the televised briefing from Garissa, Inspector General of Police Joseph Boinnet also declared a curfew beginning Friday and ending on April 16 from dusk to dawn not only in Garissa but also in Tana River, Wajir and Mandera. Residents will not be allowed outdoors between 6.30pm and 6.30am unless with express permission from the police.
And in compliance with President Uhuru Kenyatta’s directive, he said he would be announcing on Tuesday when 10,000 recruited to the police service should report for training.
The recruitment of the 10,000 had been stopped by the High Court in October 2014 following reports that the exercise was not above board.
Justice Isaac Lenaola had directed that there be a fresh recruitment exercise.
But on Thursday, in response to the Garissa attack, President Kenyatta said Kenya could not afford to wait for its security forces to be bolstered any longer.
A Sh20 million bounty has been placed on Mohamed Mohamud, alias Dulyadin alias Gamadhere by the Kenyan government as he is believed to be the mastermind of Thursday’s terror attack on university students.
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