MANY KILLED IN KENYA FEUD
13.7.2005. 19:21:55
Up to 66 people, around 22 of them children, have been killed and dozens wounded in a bloody raid on a remote village in eastern Kenya.
Residents said the raid was an inter-clan attack sparked by long-running disputes over water and pasture.
Witnesses who ferried some of the most seriously injured to hospital spoke of a grisly attack with dead bodies lying on the streets of the remote village of Turbi.
They said members of the Borana clan invaded and shot the victims, all of whom are believed to belong to the rival Gabra clan.
In Nairobi, police said at least 19 people — 15 villagers and four attackers — had died in a raid on one compound or manyatta in Turbi, about 580 kilometres northeast of the capital, but said the death toll could rise.
However, residents of Marsabit, the nearest town to Turbi about 150 km south, said between 21 and 23 people had died in the attack.
Others, including a local businessman who has radio contact with Turbi said at least 23 people, the majority of them children, had been killed but his death toll could not be confirmed by independent sources.
Roba Eleme, a mechanic with Kenya’s water ministry who brought 12 seriously wounded Turbi residents to Marsabit for treatment, said he had seen numerous dead bodies outside one large house and several in the street.
“I could not count, but there are very many people dead as many as 30 or even 100 and most of them are apparently children who it appeared were running out of the house,” he said.
The two clans have feuded persistently over water and pasture in the region.
