Four people have been killed and no fewer than 10 more injured after the bus they were travelling in struck a suspected improvised explosive device planted in the road in Mandera County in northern Kenya, close to the border with Somalia, a government official has announced.
The bus was en route from Lafey to Mandera and passing along the Arabia Road, a desert highway, when the explosion took place.
A government coordinator, Nicholas Ndalana, told Reuters that four of the wounded are in critical condition.
Osman Liban, a resident of Mandera, told the news agency his nephew was among those injured and that his relative had sustained a fractured leg in the explosion.
While it was not immediately clear who was responsible, the area has been targeted by members of neighbouring Somalia’s al-Shabaab Islamist terrorist faction.
The group has attacked security personnel, schools, vehicles, towns and telephone lines nearby with a view to pressuring Kenya into withdrawing its soldiers from Somalia, stationed there since 2011 and part of a 20,000-strong African Union peacekeeping force in place.
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