Kenyan court hands life, long-term jail sentences to terror convicts

A Kenyan court on Wednesday jailed three convicts for abetting the Garissa University terror attack where 148 people, mainly students, were killed and several others injured in April 2015.

Nairobi chief magistrate Francis Andayi sentenced Mohammed Abdi Abdikar and Hassan Edin Hassan to 41 years in prison while Rashid Mberesero was handed life imprisonment for his involvement in the terror act.

Andayi said Abdikar and Hassan were found to be remorseful and were not found at the scene of a crime after being arrested at different places in Garissa and Mandera in northeast Kenya, while Mberesero who was found at the scene of the crime had indicated he was going to join Al-Shabab in Somalia.

Andayi said evidence against Abdikar and Hassan does not make them as principal offenders but secondary offenders and thus sentenced them to 41 years.

On April 2, 2015, armed Al-Shabab gunmen stormed Garissa University and shot indiscriminately, killing 148 people, among them students and security officers and injuring 79.

Kenya has been rocked by a series of terror attacks by Al-Shabab since 2011 when its troops joined a UN-backed security force that is seeking to tackle the al-Qaida affiliate in Somalia.

Xihuanet