Sunday, December 08, 2013
After months of bloodshed, a tenuous calm has returned to Kenya's northern border town of Garissa, as a result of security operations to contain Al-Shabaab assailants linked to a series of killings.
Garissa County Commissioner Rashid Khator said the operation had been successful in netting those behind the attacks and had been expanded to other towns.
"We managed to weed out and stifle those carrying out these heinous attacks and managed to infiltrate and destroy their axis of evil. It's the fruits of these that the people of Garissa are now enjoying the relative calm in place," Khator told Xinhua in an interview on Friday in Garissa.
The operation commenced immediately after the May 18 attack on a popular restaurant in town, which left 10 people dead and scores of others injured.
The Kenya Defense Forces (KDF) launched an incursion into southern Somalia in October 2011 in pursuit of Al-Shabaab militants held responsible for kidnapping foreigners and undermining the East African country's pillar industry of tourism.
The cross-border has since sparked a backlash, with the Al- Qaida linked group vowing to avenging the KDF action.
In Kenya's ongoing operation, up to 5,000 security forces are deployed to the town to beef up security along the country's porous border with Somalia.
"We thank our government, residents and more so God for pulling together and ensuring that peace returned to this volatile town. We only hope in the coming year we will not have a relapse to the dark days," said Shukran Hussein lawmaker from Garissa.
Her sentiments are echoed by Garissa Governor Nadhif Jama who vowed to steer the country towards development.
"In the early part of this year we have been forced to cancel numerous times our planned investors forum for this region after potential investors expressed security fears because of increased attacks from Al-Shabaab," said Nadhif. "Now that things have improved we are planning to hold an investors forum early next year."