At least 14 people were reported killed on Thursday (April 2) when Islamist militants stormed a university campus near Kenya’s border with Somalia, taking Christian students hostage and battling security forces over several hours. The number of people wounded had risen to 65, Kenya’s national disaster agency said.
Students being evacuated after the attack on Garissa University College on April 2, 2015
Police and soldiers surrounded and sealed off Garissa University College and were attempting to flush out the gunmen, the head of Kenya’s police force, Joseph Boinet, said in a statement.
Somali militant group al Shabaab, which has links to al Qaeda, claimed responsibility for the pre-dawn raid and said it was holding many Christian hostages inside.
Al Shabaab has in the past carried out attacks in Garissa, which lies around 200 kilometres (120 miles) from the porous Somali border, and in other parts of Kenya.
It was responsible for a deadly attack in 2013 on the upscale Westgate shopping mall in Nairobi, having declared it would punish Kenya for sending troops into Somalia alongside African Union peacekeepers to fight the group.
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