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Kenya station attacker was rogue officer, not Islamist militant

The shooter who kept security agents at the station for hours graduated from the Kiganjo police training college in 2013.

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A Kenyan police officer shot and killed seven colleagues, including a hostage response team member, before the standoff ended in a shootout, a police report said Thursday.

The dawn incident happened after the man, who had been arrested by the police, snatched a gun from one of the officers on duty and started shooting indiscriminately at the police.

An Associated Press reporter at the scene said gunshots could be heard after police commandos went into the building, and two nearby schools have been closed and the children evacuated.

Kenya has been trying to contain growing extremism influenced by the al-Qaida-linked al-Shabab group based in neighboring Somalia.

“The gunman … turned out to be a local police officer who for yet unknown reasons, went berserk and grabbed a firearm”, spokesman George Kinoti said in a statement late on Thursday.

He killed Recce Squad officer Dennis Momanyi , OCS Vitalis Ochido, Wilson Karani, Katana Kitu, Gideon Ochieng, Robert Kinyua and Cornelius Rono.

Al Shabaab has been attacking Kenyan military and police in recent years to drive the Kenyan forces out of Somalia, where the Kenyans are part of an African army inside Somalia fighting al Shabaab.

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Kenyan television channel KTN said as many as six officers had died in the continuing stand-off.

A separate police statement to the media said the officer'for yet unknown reasons went berserk and grabbed a firearm and started shooting people