Al-Shabab says it killed more than 100 Kenyan troops in El-Adde. On 17 January, Al-Shabaab’s Radio Andalus broadcast the voices of two alleged Kenyan Defence Forces (KDF) soldiers captured in the attack.
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Kenya is involved in a search and rescue operation for its soldiers after an African Union base was attacked by Al-Shabab militants in El Adde, Somalia.
A coffin draped in the national flag is carried away from the aircraft by military pallbearers, at a ceremony to receive the bodies of four Kenyan soldiers who were killed in Somalia, at Wilson Airport in Nairobi, Kenya Monday, Jan. 18, 2016. “We have engaged the enemy and severely degraded him”, he added. “We are trying to search for them, rescue them and recover them”, Mwathethe said without saying if they were captured.
“I urge all Kenyans to continue praying for KDF and the bereaved families of those who lost their lives in the recent attack”, he said. The armed group, which has ties with al-Qaida, opposes Kenyas military involvement in Somalia and describes Kenyan peacekeepers as invaders.
Al-Shabaab has claimed responsibility for some of the worst terror attacks in East Africa, including a massacre at a Kenyan university that killed 148 people.
The military camp which the attacker attacked is located about 550 km from the Kenyan border in Mogadishu’s south west Ceel Cedo district.
The Prime Minister also stressed that the cowardly terrorist attack by Al Shabab will not deter nor hamper the government’s astute plan in eliminating and eradicating the remnants of the terrorist group from the whole country.
Paul D. Williams is an associate professor of global affairs at The George Washington University in Washington and has written about the African Union Mission in Somalia.
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The commander of Somali troops in the Gedo region, General Abbas Ibrahim Gurey, tells VOA’s Somali service that the unit’s commander was given word of a possible attack hours before the first bullet was sacked. President Uhuru Kenyatta confirmed on Friday that some soldiers had been killed in the attack, which involved suicide auto bombs and gunmen.
