A Kenyan high court judge on Friday ordered the release of two suspects charged with murder over last Novemberâs bombing of an Israeli-owned hotel in Mombasa, a year to the day after the attack which killed 18 people. Justice Kaplana Rawal ordered the release of Faiz Abdalla Shariff and Mohamed Ali Hassan, two of nine suspects in the bombing who appeared in court on Friday, after the state prosecutor withdrew charges against them. "The proceedings of the hearings of this case have been terminated and the accused persons are free to go," Rawal said. "The attorney general has ruled that, after evaluating the evidence in totality and taking into account the fact that investigating terrorism takes a long time, and in view of the faceless nature of the people involved, it has been found necessary that the charges against the accused persons be withdrawn," Prosecutor John Gacivih said.
| That means something, no doubt, even though it doesn't appear to make any sense... |
On Friday, the state also reduced charges from murder to conspiracy to commit a felony against three others accused in the bombing: Mohammed Kubwa Seif, Said Saggar Ahmed and Salmin Mohamed Khamisi. "This is being done strictly in view of the evidence available. The three, whose charges (of murder) have been withdrawn, will be charged with conspiracy to commit a felony in a lower court," Gacivih said.
| Keep working on it. Maybe you can get them for jaywalking or spitting in public... |
Four others, Omar Said Omar, Mohamed Kubwa, Aboud Rogo Mohammed and Mohamed Ali Saleh Nabhan, were charged afresh on 15 counts of murder over the suicide bombing of the Mombasa Paradise hotel on November 28 last year. The four pleaded not guilty and Rawal set the dates of their hearing "from January 26, day to day, to February 26."
| Wonder what the charges will be reduced to then... |
Twelve Kenyans, three Israelis and three presumed bombers died in the attack on the hotel, carried out almost simultaneously with a failed missile attack on a charter jet carrying Israeli tourists shortly after take-off from Mombasa airport. Osama bin Ladenâs al-Qaeda network has claimed responsibility for both attacks. About 250 people, victims and relatives, gathered outside the Mombasa hotel, weeping, wailing and praying as they marked the one-year anniversary of the tragedy. Among the mourners was receptionist Mercy Mwagambo, was on duty last November 28, when a car laden with explosives slammed into the hotel lobby. "I had many injuries and my right leg had first to be amputated before being sewn back at hospital after the bombing," Mwagambo, 25, said, supporting herself on crutches. Mwagambo lamented that her injury had completely ruined her family, as she was the sole breadwinner. She was only recently discharged from hospital and is still awaiting compensation, she said.
| Just a civilian. She doesn't count. She's not even Muslim. Become a Muslim and the Soddies will probably throw some compensation your way, assuming you can come up with a male guardian... |
The Mombasa attacks highlighted the enormous security challenges faced by Kenya, which has long, remote and highly porous borders with Somalia, Sudan, Ethiopia, Tanzania and Uganda, but has limited financial and human resources to patrol them. Somalia has been without a central government since 1991, when dictator Mohamed Siad Barre was ousted and the country fell into a cycle of clan warfare and lawlessness. The United Nations has said in a report published early this month that Somalia served as a rear base for extremists who planned and carried out the Mombasa bombing, and that the missiles fired at the jet were smuggled into Kenya by sea from Somalia in August last year, three months before the attacks.
| I used to know some Rangers who were hoping for an opportunity to go back and visit Mogadishu... |
Businessman Said Omar - one of the four accused who will go on trial in January on murder charges - has been accused of helping other suspects flee to neighbouring Somalia following the attack. Kenyan police are still hunting for Ali Saleh Nabhan - a brother of one of the suspects who will go on trial in January - suspected of having bought the car used in the suicide attack on the Paradise Hotel, and of allowing the bomb used in the explosion to be built up in his apartment. They are also hunting Comoran national Fazul Abdullah Mohammed, already on a wanted list in the United States for his alleged involvement in twin attacks on the US embassies in Nairobi and Dar es Salaam, Tanzania, in 1998, in which 224 people died. |
A Kenyan Muslim acquitted last year of murder in the 2002 al-Qaeda-linked bombing of an Israeli-owned hotel was yesterday jailed for eight years on weapons charges. Nairobi magistrate Rose-melle Mutoka convicted Omar Said Omar of having a cache of firearms, five light anti-tank missiles, one hand grenade and ammunition in Mombasa.