Blast kills three Kenyan soldiers on road near Somali border
PHOTO CAPTION: Illustrative photo — A Kenyan Defense Force soldier pauses on patrol during an exercise with U.S. Army soldiers assigned to the Combined Joint Task Force — Horn of Africa to evaluate his surroundings, Feb. 3, 2022. (U.S. Air Force photo by SSgt Amy Younger via U.S. Defense Visual Information Distribution Service)
NAIROBI - A blast has killed three Kenyan soldiers patrolling a road in the east of the country near the Somali border, the military said.
The al Qaeda-linked Islamist group al Shabaab said on its website at least two Kenyan soldiers were killed and others wounded in a blast that targeted a convoy in a similar area on Tuesday, but it did not directly claim responsibility.
The patrol hit an Improvised Explosive Device (IED) on Tuesday morning on the road between Sankuri and Kiunga, a coastal town 12 km (7.5 miles) from the Somali border, the army said.
"Regrettably, three gallant soldiers succumbed to their injuries. These soldiers paid the ultimate sacrifice," the Kenya Defence Forces said in a statement released late on Tuesday.
Al Shabaab controls large swathes of southern and central Somalia and frequently makes cross-border attacks on military and civilian targets, which security analysts say are aimed at pressuring Kenya into withdrawing its troops from peacekeeping missions in Somalia.
(Reporting by Humphrey Malalo in Nairobi and Abdi Sheikh in Mogadishu; Writing by Hereward Holland; Editing by Alex Richardson // REUTERS)
