At least five people were beheaded this Sunday in southeast Kenya in an attack attributed to members of the Somali jihadist group Al Shabab, police confirmed.
“All five were dragged from their homes and tied with ropes before being killed,” said Lamu sub-county police commander Harrison Njuguna.
The attack occurred this Sunday morning in the town of Salama, near the Kenyan border with Somalia. According to Njuguna, the attack may have been motivated by “a grazing land dispute.”
According to the testimonies collected by the local media, more than 30 men in military attire and armed with guns, machetes and knives participated.
Al Shabab attacks in the Kenyan territories near the border with Somalia have multiplied in recent months, which has left dozens dead.
In January, the Kenyan authorities acknowledged a “resurgence” of the group’s activities in the east of the country, especially along the road under construction that will link the Kenyan port of Lamu with neighboring South Sudan and Ethiopia.
The jihadist group often perpetrates attacks in the Somali capital, Mogadishu, and other parts of Somalia to overthrow the central government -backed by the international community- and establish by force an Islamic State of the Wahhabi (ultra-conservative) style.
Al Shabab controls rural areas of central and southern Somalia and also attacks neighboring countries such as Kenya and Ethiopia.
The most serious Al Shabab attack on Kenyan soil occurred in April 2015, when 148 people were killed in the assault on Garissa University (east).
