US Senate wants military aid cut over abuses

By CYRUS OMBATI

The US Senate wants the American Government to stop providing aid to the Kenyan military and police over alleged abuse of human rights in Mt Elgon and North Eastern.

In its latest report in the US Senate Foreign Appropriation Bill 2013, the Senate recommended that the funding be stopped until thorough and credible investigations on the violations are conducted and the units involved identified.

“The Committee directs the Secretary of State to take steps to ensure that no United States training, equipment, or other assistance is provided to any Kenyan military or police personnel who have been credibly alleged to have violated human rights,” says part of the report.

The report says the abuses in Mt Elgon were committed in March 2008 while those in Garissa, Wajir and Mandera in North Eastern Kenya were between November last year, and January 2012 and in the Dadaab refugee camps in North Eastern Kenya in December last year.

The report dated May 24 orders the Secretary of State to submit a report to the Committee on steps taken by the Government of Kenya to conduct thorough, credible investigations of such violations and the identification of military units responsible.

This is the second time that the US Senate is making such recommendations on the military after that of Mt Elgon.

It followed a report by Human Rights Watch (HRW), which said Government troops joined the guerrilla militia in Mt Elgon in “committing murder, torture and rape of innocent victims”.

Letters

In March 13, HRW wrote to Defense Minister Yusuf Haji seeking answers on letters it had written to the ministry previously over violations meted on people in Mt Elgon and in northern Kenya in the ongoing Operation Linda Nchi in Somalia.

The letter signed by Leslie Lefkow, HRW’s Deputy Director of Africa Division also stated that it is in the process of documenting abuses by both the military and Al Shabaab members and their sympathisers both in Northern part of Kenya and Somalia.

Earlier this year, the Department of Defence formed a board of inquiry into abuses reported in Garisa, Wajir and Mandera but little has been heard of its outcome.