Teusday 21 December 2010
By Humphrey Malalo and Elias Biryabarema
Ugandan security agencies had already said they were on high alert for strikes by insurgents after twin suicide bombings in Kampala on July 11, which killed 79 people watching the World Cup final on television.
The Somali rebel group al-Shabaab, which says it has links to al Qaeda, claimed responsibility for the Kampala bombings.
"We believe there's a connection between the threats we're getting from al-Shabaab and other al Qaeda affiliated groups and the attack in Nairobi," Uganda's top police officer, Inspector General Kale Kayihura, told media on Tuesday.
"Following the July 11 attacks, the Nairobi terrorist act and the constant threats by al Shabaab and other terrorists, there's a strong possibility that these groups might want to repeat their diabolical plans and there's information that these people want to carry out attacks on Kampala."
Kayihura said the Ugandan police were stepping up security at border points with Kenya and Sudan.
Kenya's President Mwai Kibaki said no efforts would be spared to ensure security was beefed up.
Kenyan police -- who said they were not ruling out terrorism in their investigations -- said the blast in Nairobi was set off when a man dropped a plastic bag as he was about to board a bus.
Police Commissioner Matthew Iteere said the explosion was caused by a Russian-made grenade, which the attacker, Albert Molanda, who had entered Kenya in October this year from Tanzania, had intended to transport to Kampala.
No group has so far claimed the blast, but Iteere said the motive could have been inspired by the utterances of al Shabaab.
ISLAM CONVERTS
"In these incidents which have happened, we have found that most people perpetrating this type of crime are people who have recently converted to Islamic faith. These are the people who have been radicalised and indoctrinated," he said.
Twice hit by al Qaeda-linked attacks, Kenya has long cast a wary eye at its lawless neighbour Somalia, where al Shabaab militants have been waging a three-year insurgency against the Western-backed Somali government and want to impose a harsh version of sharia law.
"We have confirmed that it was an act of one person and this is the person who died in the incident. We are yet to gather if he was working with other people," Iteere told a media briefing.
A woman the police had said had died in hospital after suffering serious wounds during the blast had in fact not died.
Several people were wounded during the incident.
Iteere said the suspect had became nervous when he realised he would be subjected to a security search before boarding the Kampala-bound coach. At this point, he dropped the bag and then it exploded.
Iteere said investigations showed that recent converts to Islam were behind one of the strikes by unidentified men who killed three police officers in attacks in Nairobi on December 3. The U.S. Federal Bureau of Investigation is helping in the probe.
Source: Reuters