{UAH} Gun attack on Kenyan shopping centre kills at least 20
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Gun attack on Kenyan shopping centre kills at least 20
Witnesses say gunmen told Muslims to leave Nairobi's Westgate centre and shot people they believed were non-Muslimsail
At least 20 people have been killed in a suspected terrorist attack in the Kenyan capital of Nairobi after gunmen opened fire and threw grenades in an upmarket shopping centre.
Witnesses said the men, brandishing AK47s, told Muslims to leave and shot those they believed were non-Muslims.
"It is a possibility that it is an attack by terrorists, so we are treating the matter very seriously," Mutea Iringo, the principal secretary in the ministry of interior, told Reuters.
A wounded woman is helped to safety after gunmen opened fire in a shopping centre in Nairobi, Kenya. Photograph: Simon Maina/AFP/Getty Images"Clear the area. We urge the public to keep off Westgate mall," the Ministry said in a statement on its Twitter account.
Abbas Guled, the secretary general of the Kenya Red Cross Society, said at least 20 people had been killed and another 50 were wounded in the attack at about midday.
The Nairobi police chief, Benson Kibue, said officers were engaged in a shootout with the attackers. He initially said the men had been trying to rob a shop within the centre but later described the incident as a terrorist attack.
Elijah Kamau told the Associated Press the gunmen made the statement about Muslims as they began their attack.
A Kenyan woman is carried away from the shopping centre. Photograph: Simon Maina/AFP/Getty ImagesThe interior ministry asked local media not to televise the gun battle live because the gunmen were watching the screens in the mall.
Armed police arrived nearly half an hour after the attack began and engaged the gunmen in a shootout. Officers shouted: "Get out, get out", and scores of shoppers fled the building. At least half a dozen were bloodied and helped by first-aiders.
Security guards used shopping trollies to wheel out several wounded children and at least one man.
Rob Vandijk, who works at the Dutch embassy, said he was eating at a restaurant in the shopping centre when attackers lobbed grenades inside the building. He said gunfire then burst out and people screamed as they dropped to the ground.
A former British soldier told reporters: "I personally touched the eyes of four people and they were dead. One of them was a child. It's carnage up there."
Cars were left abandoned outside the centre, which is located in the city's affluent Westlands area and is frequented by expatriates and wealthy Kenyans.
Other witnesses said they had seen about five armed assailants storm the shopping centre and that the incident appeared to be an attack rather than an armed robbery.
"They don't seem like thugs. This is not a robbery incident," Yukeh Mannasseh told Reuters. "It seems like an attack. The guards who saw them said they were shooting indiscriminately."
Kenya has seen a rise in terrorist attacks and threats in recent years, some of which are believed to be in retaliation for a military crackdown on the Somalian militant group al-Shabaab. The group vowed in 2011 to carry out a large-scale attack in Nairobi in retaliation for Kenya sending troops into Somalia to fight them.
The attacks often involve gunmen armed with automatic weapons and grenades, and their targets include bars, nightclubs and restaurants in various parts of the country. A suspected al-Shabaab attack in January left five people dead and three injured at a restaurant in the eastern city of Garissa. While in August last year one person was killed and six injured in the Eastleigh area of Nairobi on the eve of a visit by Hillary Clinton, the then US secretary of state.
Last month 18 of the 19 US embassies and consulates across the Middle East and Africa were closed after a message between al-Qaida officials about plans for a major terrorist attack was intercepted
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