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HRW Says 34 People Missing In Terror Crackdown

At least 34 people have mysteriously disappeared and 11 others were killed in what is suspected to be the coordinated work of local security forces, a new report by a human rights watchdog has revealed. Witness statements collected by Human Rights Watch (HRW) indicate that all the 45 victims may have been under investigation for alleged links to Al-Shabaab.



All of the 11 dead people had reportedly been arrested by state agents before they went missing and their bodies later found far from where they had been arrested.
The incidents occured between 2013 and 2015.
Over 117 people were interviewed for the report, including witnesses to arrests and raids, Kenya Defence Forces personnel and police officers with inside knowledge of the operations, political leaders in the national and county governments, clerics and journalists.

One of those interviewed was a 48-year-old man, who told HRW that police arrested him in May 2015, held him for two days at the Wajir Police Station and then transferred him to a Wajir military base.
“He said that military officers later arrested his elder brother and held them both at Wajir military base. The military officers kicked, slapped, and beat the man, and gave him electric shocks, then released him after 15 days,” reads the report.

His brother’s whereabouts are unknown.

Security officers from various units reportedly raided homes and compounds, business premises and schools to arrest individuals and conduct searches, sometimes in the middle of the night.
Most of the arresting officers were “not uniformed and did not have identification insignia and failed to identify themselves,” reads the report.

In a few instances, the officers wore uniforms associated with Kenyan security agencies — either police or military — while in others, the officers, though not uniformed, carried military or police identity cards or drove vehicles with official government insignia.The watchdog has on several occasions appealed to President Uhuru Kenyatta to “publicly acknowledge the scope and gravity of the numerous allegations and condemn any such abuses by security forces.”

Only the Kenya Wildlife Service responded to HRW’s questions, but only to deny having any knowledge of the missing or dead persons.

Other government officials and agencies have not responded to HRW queries concerning the whereabouts of the missing people or whether any investigations were under way.

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