By James Shimanyula
NAIROBI
At least 36 people were killed in the early hours of Tuesday by suspected Al-Shabaab militants in Kenya's northeastern Mandera County, a security official confirms.
"We have reports of the killing of 36 people. Our people are on the ground to verify the number of those killed," Interior Ministry spokesman Mwenda Njoka told The Anadolu Agency on phone.
"The killers crossed the border and retreated into Somalia," he said, promising to release an official statement later.
However, Njoka, who was in an impromptu meeting at the ministry, was not in a position to say precisely where the killing occurred.
But a local resident of Mandera, who did not want to be identified, told AA by telephone that the attack took place at a quarry, about 13 km from Mandera town.
"From what we have gathered, the 36 were paraded and shot by attackers who immediately fled," he said.
He said the slain workers live in tents near the quarry and were attacked shortly before 3am local time.
The Mandera attack comes ten days after suspected Al-Shabaab militants killed 28 people in the same county in an attack on a bus traveling to the capital Nairobi.
The attack was claimed by Al-Shabaab, an Al-Qaeda-linked group opposed to the deployment of Kenyan troops in Somalia.
In recent years, Al-Shabaab has carried out attacks in Nairobi and in Kenya's northeastern region.
In September 2013, at least 67 people were killed in a four-day-long hostage-taking saga in an upmarket Nairobi shopping mall that was eventually claimed by Al-Shabaab.
www.aa.com.tr/en
