Two injured in mysterious Garissa attack

Garissa, Kenya: Two armed people were on Tuesday evening shot and seriously wounded in Garissa town, Garissa County.

The two were shot by a gang of unidentified assailants along Ngamia Road adjacent to Gulied Hotel in the middle of Garissa town at around 4pm.

Police were alerted of the shooting by members of the public. When police responded to rescue the victims, they found two pistols in their possession.

Speaking to The Standard at the Garissa General Hospital the local County Commissioner Rashid Khator said the two, who were being treated at the hospital, were under police watch.

“We suspect the two were planning criminal activities before they were shot by another group of armed people who may have been following them,” Khator said.

“Our officers have handed over the recovered firearms to balistic experts to ascertain their origin and whether they were used in the renewed mystery killings witnessed in Garissa town in the recent past," he said.

He added that the victims will help the security agents  unravel the mystery.

Curious public onlookers jammed the hospital disrupting medical services to the patients, forcing security personnel accompanying the wounded culprits to use teargas canisters to disperse them.

Khator decline to comment whether the attackers could be the members of the Somali Islamist group Al-Shabaab who have claimed responsibility for previous killings in the town.

A sources who sought anonymity said the victims who were shot are close relatives of the cleric who was shot dead recently near Khalif Mosque a few metres from the scene of Tuesday attack.