[ 2015-04-03 ]

Kenya shocked but defiant after al-Shabaab massacre 147 at Garissa University
Grieving relatives were searching for news or the
remains of their loved ones after Somalia's
al-Shabaab Islamists massacred 147 in a university
in north-east Kenya.

The day-long siege of Garissa University was
Kenya's deadliest attack since the 1998 US embassy
bombings and the biggest ever by the
al-Qaeda-affiliated militants, although the Kenyan
government vowed it would not be "intimidated".

Survivors recounted how the gunmen from Somalia's
Shabaab fighters taunted students before killing
them, including forcing them to call their parents
to urge them to call for Kenyan troops to leave
Somalia - before then still shooting them.

The militants appeared to have planned
extensively, even targeting a site where
Christians had gone to pray.

Survivor Helen Titus told The Associated Press on
Friday: "They investigated our area. They knew
everything." Titus, a 21-year-old English
literature student, was shot in the wrist and is
being treated at a hospital in Garissa, where the
attack by al-Shabaab Islamic extremists happened.

One of the first things that the assailants did
early Thursday, she said, was to head for a
lecture hall where Christians were in early
morning prayer. Also Friday, a few men walked down
a road in Garissa with signs including one that
read "We are against the killing of innocent
Kenyans!!!! We are tired!!"

As the gunmen prowled the university rooms hunting
down more people to kill, some students smeared
blood from their dead friends over their bodies to
pretend they too had been shot.

The day-long seige ended with all four of the
gunmen detonating suicide vests in a hail of heavy
gunfire. At least 79 people were also wounded in
the attack on the campus, which lies near the
border with Somalia.

On Friday, a huge crowd of traumatised and shocked
survivors and relatives of those killed or missing
gathered at the university gate.

"I am so worried, I had a son who was among the
students trapped inside the college, and since
yesterday I have heard nothing," said Habel
Mutinda, an elderly man, his face streaming with
tears.

"I tried to identify his body among those
killed... I have to do that before the body goes
bad in the heat.. I have been camping overnight,
it is really hard, it hurts."

Emergency workers set about collecting the bodies,
while Kenyan soldiers patrolled the campus.

Visiting the scene of the carnage, Joseph
Nkaissery, Kenya's interior minister, vowed that
the country would not bow to terrorist threats.

"Kenya's government will not be intimidated by the
terrorists who have made killing innocent people a
way to humiliate the government," he told
reporters, promising the government will "fight
back".

"I am confident we shall win this war against our
enemies."

Source - The Telegraph

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