Five Soldiers Killed, Ten Injured In Kenya

Five Kenya Soldiers Killed By Unknown Attacker.

Kenya has lost five soldiers while ten others are seriously injured following an unknown source of attack from an improvised bomb.

The Kenya Defence Forces (KDF) and government officials confirmed the incident which took place at around 8 a.m. local time (0500 GMT) along the Kiunga and Sankuri road in coastal county of Lamu.

No group has claimed responsibility for the attack.

In a similar development, NAN reports that Aug. 8, five soldiers were killed in an attack claimed by the li group al Shaabab in Lamu County on Kenya’s north coast.

The local government official in the county, who asked not to be named, said the attack occurred between the areas of Majengo and Bodhei.

He said five soldiers were killed after their truck ran over an improvised explosive device.

“We heard a blast. Shortly after, KDF choppers were patrolling in the air,” the official told Reuters.

Kenya Defence Forces spokesman Lt.-Col. Paul Njuguna told Reuters that six soldiers were injured, two critically, in the explosion but none were killed.

It was not immediately clear why the accounts of the KDF and the county official differed.

Abdiasis Musab, al Shabaab’s spokesman for military operations, said the group was behind the attack on the KDF convoy, and put the number of those killed at nine.

Kenyan officials say the group often exaggerates casualty figures.

The al Qaeda-linked al Shabaab aims to topple lia’s U.N.-backed government and impose its own strict interpretation of Islam.

They have intensified attacks in Kenya since it sent troops into lia in 2011.

The group has launched several attacks, including ones in which they have beheaded people, in the past year in the coastal county.

Kenyan security officials say the militants have used the Boni forest straddling the Kenya-lia border as a hideout and base for attacks.