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              Kenyan Police Accused of Torture, Arbitrary Arrests

   by Mohammed Yusuf

   [1]Human Rights Watch (HRW) said Kenyan police officers have subjected
   more than 1,000 ethnic Somalis to torture, rape and arbitrary arrests.
   The [2]alleged abuses were in apparent response to grenade attacks in a
   predominantly Somali part of Nairobi, carried out by militants with
   suspected links to the Somali militant group al-Shabab.
   Human Rights Watch says Kenyan police carried out 70 days of what the
   group calls "terror" in Nairobi's Eastleigh neighborhood.
   The alleged abuses took place between November and January, a little
   more than a year after Kenyan troops entered Somalia to battle
   al-Shabab.
   Human Rights Watch says that in addition to the alleged abuses, Kenyan
   authorities forcibly relocated a number of Somali refugees to camps in
   northeastern Kenya.
   Speaking to journalists in Nairobi Tuesday, Human Rights Watch Senior
   Refugee Researcher Gerry Simpson accused the Kenyan police of calling
   their victims "terrorists" and extorting money from them.
   "Every single person we interviewed told us police branded them
   terrorists and so it seems that at least one of the main reasons for
   these abuses is that the police took upon themselves to punish men,
   women and children for attacks by unknown people that had taken place
   in Kenya since October 2011," he said.
   Kenyan forces went into Somalia in October 2011 to secure the border
   following a series of attacks and kidnappings in Kenyan territory
   blamed on al-Shabab.  Al-Shabab vowed to attack inside Kenya in
   response to the Kenyan incursion.
   Kenyan police spokesman Masoud Mwinyi said there will always be
   complaints against police and the way they execute their work.
   Mwinyi said some police officers may have overstepped regulations when
   dealing with security matters.
   "We also acknowledge once in a while we might have some incidents of
   some officers getting excited or going out of their mandate," he said.
   The rights group interviewed 101 people.  Ninety-six were refugees with
   documentation and the rest were Kenyan citizens who were ethnic
   Somalis.
   HRW's Gerry Simpson said that what strikes his organization was that no
   one stopped the attacks against the residents by police.
   "So at the very best, senior police commanders simply allowed this to
   happen and turned a blind eye and at the very worst they actually
   encouraged their officers to commit these abuses," he said.
   Human Rights Watch has called on the United Nations refugee agency,
   UNHCR, to document and report any abuses against refugees and asylum
   seekers in Kenya.
   The government of Kenya has repeatedly promised to investigate
   accusations leveled against its security forces.  But according to
   Human Rights Watch, so far no serious action has been taken by the
   government.
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   [3]http://www.voanews.com/content/human-rights-watch-charges-kenya-with
   -torture-arbitrary-arrests-of-somalis/1670519.html

References

   1. http://www.hrw.org/news/2013/05/29/kenya-police-abuse-nairobi-s-refugees
   2. http://www.hrw.org/sites/default/files/reports/kenya0513_ForUpload_0_0.pdf
   3. http://www.voanews.com/content/human-rights-watch-charges-kenya-with-torture-arbitrary-arrests-of-somalis/1670519.html