Kenyan police and unknown attackers exchanged gunfire overnight at the Nairobi residence of Somali President Abdullahi Yusuf Ahmed, witnesses inside his house said on Wednesday.
”I don’t know the motive of the attack, no one was hurt and that is all what I can tell you,” said a resident who asked to remain unnamed.
Police in Nairobi said they have received claims of responsibility for the exchange of fire in the compound of Yusuf’s residence.
”We sent several officers there, but we are yet to prove anything,” a police spokesperson said, adding they have reinforced security around Yusuf’s house in a western suburb of the Kenyan capital.
Yusuf, a veteran Somali faction leader and soldier, was sworn in as new president of his Horn of Africa nation on October 14 in Nairobi, in the first conclusive attempt to pacify Somalia, which plunged into turmoil immediately after the ousting of dictator Siad Barre in January 1991.
But his administration is expected to remain for some time in Nairobi, where it was formed, because the war-torn Somali capital, Mogadishu, is considered not safe enough. — Sapa-AFP