Kenyan officials escape death after attack

MANDERA, Kenya - Two Kenyan government officials on Tuesday escaped death narrowly after the car in which they were patrolling in missed a remote controlled explosive device in the eastern town of Mandera bordering Somalia.

Eye witnesses told Xinhua that the device exploded just two minutes after the vehicle carrying the Kenya Revenue Authority (KRA) officials had passed near the Mandera cereals and produce broad deport in eastern Kenya.

The witnesses said the two officials who escaped death by a whisker could not believe their eyes with one busting into cries.

"Immediately after the incident one of them was had conversing in his mother tongue over the phone," said the witness who did not want to be named.

Mandera East District Commissioner Benson Leparmorijo confirmed the incident and said the attackers were seemingly targeting the occupants of the vehicle for unknown motive, but luckily they missed them after the device delayed to go off immediately.

Leparmorijo said no body was arrested in connection with the incident as hundreds of the residents rushed to the scene of the explosion, making hard for the police officers who rushed to scene to pursue those who would have been behind the criminal act.

There has been a series of landmine attacks or explosions in northern and eastern Kenya ever since Kenya launched cross border incursions into Somalia in mid October.

The dual military operation is targeting Somali militants, blamed for a string of abductions and murders on the Kenya soil.

In total about seven security officers were killed in ten attacks that has occurred in Mandera town, while 19 people were killed in Garissa County among them five security officers.

At least five people were killed on New Year's Eve while 20 others seriously injured as they were ushering in the new year after two hand grenades were hurled at them by suspected Al Shabaab militias.

And the following day, four men shot dead a peacemaker at Ifo refugee camp in Dadaab district. The man, who was a member of Lutheran World Federation (LWF) peace committee, was shot several times from a close range.

During the past few weeks, scores of Al-Shabaab fighters have been killed by Kenyan troops in southern Somalia where the dual military operation has been targeting the militants blamed for sporadic abductions on Kenyan soil.

The militia group, which is aligned to al Qaeda network, has said before that it would attack Kenya but so far has never done so. The police believe the attacks are being carried out by Al- Shabaab sympathizers who are in Kenya.

The attack came as security was heightened in major towns over fears of terror attacks. The police had earlier banned celebrations to mark to usher into New Year and told the organizers to inform the police before holding such gathers.

Kenyan security personnel patrolling the Somalia border have been hit with a series of explosion attacks since Kenya sent its troops to fight Al-Shabaab inside Somalia, often killing or injuring officers.

The forces at the border points are grappling with threats posed by the insurgents who have been laying landmines mainly targeting police and soldiers patrolling the Somalia border.

Since the Kenya military incursion into Somalia, several attacks believed to have been carried out by Al-Shabaab have occurred in Mandera, Wajir, and Garissa and Dadaab districts of northern Kenya even as the military reports gains against the Islamist group by capturing their military bases and killing scores of them.