Kenyans have continued to live in fear after three almost simultaneous explosions occurred in Nairobi's Eastleigh neighborhood, which killed six people and injured 25 others Monday, March 31st 2014.
On Sunday 23 March 2014 terrorists attacked Christians worshipers at the “Joy in Jesus Church” in Mombasa during the Sunday worship.
The Nairobi's Eastleigh attack happened only a day after one man, alleged to be a terrorist, died in a house in the same estate after an explosive he was assembling went awry.
Police launched a security operation in Eastleigh following the Monday's attack, arresting 657 suspects, said Cabinet Secretary for Interior and Coordination of National Government Joseph Ole Lenku.
In the meantime, the controversial preacher and fiery jihadist Sheikh Abubakar Shariff aka ‘Makaburi’ was gunned down by unknown assailants on Tuesday 1 April 2014.
Sheikh Makaburi was felled by a hail of bullets as he left the Shimo La Tewa Maximum Prison in
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| Sheikh Abubakar Shariff aka ‘Makaburi’ |
Mombasa in the evening as he was coming awaited a decision from the Shanzu Law Courts where he had applied for easing of his bail conditions from cases related to tourism.
Makaburi was killed two days after intelligence officials linked him to the March 23 killing of worshippers in a Mombasa church.
Makaburi is accused of recruiting Muslim youth into Al Shabaab and radicalising them, charges he denied, despite holding extremist views of Islam.
Police had accused Sheikh Makaburi of advocating jihad, (holy war), radicalizing the youth in Mombasa and recruiting fighters for Al Shabaab, which has been carrying out a campaign of terror against Kenya and other countries in Eastern Africa. Sheikh Makaburi once publicly said Al Shabaab was justified in killing 67 people at Westgate shopping in Nairobi, September last year.
In various interviews with the media Sheikh justified the killings of Christians terming it as ‘true Muslims’ should attack Christians.
The officials indicated last weekend that the Anti-Terror Police Unit had concluded that Makaburi aided militants allied to Al Hijra, an affiliate of Al-Shabaab in Mombasa, to procure guns and commit the March 23, 2014 church massacre.
On another incident: Christian and Muslim leaders at the Coast have warned that extremists on both sides are sowing a “poisonous religious and political ideology” to separate the two faiths and plunge Kenya into sectarian chaos.
Meeting under the umbrella of Coast Interfaith Council of Clerics (CICC), said the terror groups should not be associated with Islam as it stands for peace and urged Muslims and Christians to be tolerant and united in the war against extremism.
The group said the Coast is now beset by violent religious extremism and intolerance between the two faiths following recent attacks and killings in mosques and churches.
But the group also acknowledged that individual Muslim extremists have demonized other religions and justified murder “in the name of Islam” and suggested that they should be treated as individual criminals.
SOURCE: AMECEA Social Communications and News Agency