NAIROBI (Somaliguardian) – Somalia-based militant group Al-Shabaab has said it captured a Kenyan government official in an attack on a town in northeastern Kenya’s Wajir County, as Islamists step up raids on police outposts and government compounds in the region.
Heavily armed fighters of the Islamist group attacked towns in Wajir and Mandera Counties in northeastern Kenya on Saturday.
The militant group claimed that its fighters had taken over the town of Gumarey in the vicinity of Wajir, where a Kenyan government official in charge of the town was captured and Al-Shabaab officers preached residents, telling them not to cooperate with Kenya’s military and security forces.
Kenya has not immediately commented on the claims by the militant group, which come weeks after Al-Shabaab killed a senior Kenyan military officer in the region.
In another assault on the town of Iliila in the northeastern Kenya’s Mandera County, militants destroyed a SAFARICOM telecommunications mast.
An exchange of gunfire between police and militants was heard in Gummarey, according to residents, but officers being unable to repel the attack were forced to flee to nearby police station in Qorof-harar.
Casualties of the gunfight have not been immediately known.
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