NAIROBI/GARISSA: Kenya’s religions unite in national mourning for massacre victims.
Kenyans prayed for unity Sunday at the start of three days of national mourning for the 148 people murdered in a university massacre by Somali militants.
Flags flew at half mast after President Uhuru Kenyatta warned that people’s “justified anger” should not lead to “the victimization of anyone, (as) this would only play into the hands of the terrorists.”
Militants lined up students during the massacre Thursday described by Kenyatta as a “barbaric medieval slaughter.”
The president vowed Saturday to retaliate in the “severest way” for the killings in the northeastern town of Garissa, close to the border with Somalia.
The massacre, Kenya’s deadliest attack since the 1998 bombing of the US Embassy in Nairobi, claimed the lives of 142 students, three police officers and three soldiers.
“The terrible events in Garissa are still fresh in our minds and heart, but today is a day for new hope,” Kenyan Anglican Archbishop Eliud Wabukala told a packed cathedral in Nairobi, as armed soldiers patrolled outside.
“These terrorists want to cause scare and divisions in our society, but we shall tell them, you will never prevail.”
Top Muslim leader Hassan Ole Naado also offered his condolences: “Kenya is at war, and we must all stand together.” The deputy head of the Supreme Council of Kenya Muslims said the organization was helping to raise money for the funerals of those killed and medical costs of the scores wounded.
Sunday’s ceremony was laden with emotion for the several hundred members of Garissa’s Christian minority, which is fearful following the attack by Shabab, a Somalia-based militant group. The gunmen who attacked Garissa University College on Thursday singled out Christians for killing, though Shabab has a long record of killing Muslims over the years.
“Thank you for coming, so many of you,” Bishop Joseph Alessandro said to the congregation. He said some of those who died in Thursday’s attack would have been at the service, and he read condolence messages from around the world.
“We deeply feel the pain of the loss of young lives,” he added in a statement, warning the Shabab was aiming to “create religious conflict.”
Political and religious leaders have condemned the attacks.
Pope Francis called the killings “senseless brutality,” while the Cairo-based top Sunni Muslim body Al-Azhar has condemned the “terrorist act committed by Somalia’s Shabab.”
On Saturday, the Shabab warned of a “long, gruesome war” unless Kenya withdrew its troops from Somalia, and threatened “another bloodbath.”
Hours after the Shabab’s warning, police in Garissa paraded four corpses of the gunmen piled on top of each other face down in the back of a pick-up truck followed by a huge crowd.
All four gunmen were killed, but five men have been arrested in connection with the attack, including three “coordinators” captured as they fled towards Somalia, and two others in the university.
The two arrested on campus included a security guard and a Tanzanian found “hiding in the ceiling” and holding grenades, the interior ministry said.
Forensic investigators aided by foreign experts continued to scour the site where one student shocked security forces on Saturday, who had said all students were accounted for, by emerging unharmed from a wardrobe where she had hidden for over two days.
The remaining 600 student survivors from the now closed college have now left Garissa for good, boarding buses for the home towns around the country.
Dozens of families of those killed continue to wait for the remains of their loved ones.
Hurling grenades and firing automatic rifles, the gunmen stormed the university at dawn on Thursday as students were sleeping, shooting dead dozens before setting Muslims free and holding Christians and others hostage.
National mourning in Kenya; faiths unite to stand together
National mourning in Kenya; faiths unite to stand together
Britain’s Starmer seeks to bolster China ties despite Trump warning
- “The UK has got a huge amount to offer,” he said in a short speech at the UK-China Business Forum at the Bank of China
SHANGHAI: Visiting Prime Minister Keir Starmer said on Friday Britain has a “huge amount to offer” China, after his bid to forge closer ties prompted warnings from US President Donald Trump.
Starmer’s trip is the first to China by a British prime minister in eight years, and follows in the footsteps of other Western leaders looking to counter an increasingly volatile United States.
Leaders from France, Canada and Finland have flocked to Beijing in recent weeks, recoiling from Trump’s bid to seize Greenland and tariff threats against NATO allies.
Trump warned on Thursday it was “very dangerous” for Britain to be dealing with China.
Starmer brushed off those comments on Friday, noting that Trump was also expected to visit China in the months ahead.
“The US and the UK are very close allies, and that’s why we discussed the visit with his team before we came,” Starmer said in an interview with UK television.
“I don’t think it is wise for the UK to stick its head in the sand. China is the second-largest economy in the world,” he said.
Asked about Trump’s comments on Friday, Beijing’s foreign ministry said “China is willing to strengthen cooperation with all countries in the spirit of mutual benefit and win-win results.”
Starmer met top Chinese leaders, including President Xi Jinping and Premier Li Qiang, on Thursday, with both sides highlighting the need for closer ties.
He told business representatives from Britain and China on Friday that both sides had “warmly engaged” and “made some real progress.”
“The UK has got a huge amount to offer,” he said in a short speech at the UK-China Business Forum at the Bank of China.
The meetings the previous day provided “just the level of engagement that we hoped for,” Starmer said.
He signed a series of agreements on Thursday, with Downing Street announcing Beijing had agreed to visa-free travel for British citizens visiting China for under 30 days, although Starmer acknowledged there was no start date for the arrangement yet.
The Chinese foreign ministry said only that it was “actively considering” the visa deal and would “make it public at an appropriate time upon completing the necessary procedures.”
Starmer hailed the agreements as “symbolic of what we’re doing with the relationship.”
He also said Beijing had lifted sanctions on UK lawmakers targeted since 2021 for their criticism of alleged human rights abuses against China’s Muslim Uyghur minority.
“President Xi said to me that that means all parliamentarians are welcome,” Starmer said in an interview with UK television.
He traveled from Beijing to economic powerhouse Shanghai, where he spoke with Chinese students at the Shanghai International College of Fashion and Innovation, a joint institute between Donghua University and the University of Edinburgh.
- Visas and whisky -
The visa deal could bring Britain in line with about 50 other countries granted visa-free travel, including France, Germany, Australia and Japan, and follows a similar agreement made between China and Canada this month.
The agreements signed included cooperation on targeting supply chains used by migrant smugglers, as well as on British exports to China, health and strengthening a bilateral trade commission.
China also agreed to halve tariffs on British whisky to five percent, according to Downing Street.
British companies sealed £2.2 billion in export deals and around £2.3 billion in “market access wins” over five years, and “hundreds of millions worth of investments,” Starmer’s government said in a statement.
Xi told Starmer on Thursday that their countries should strengthen dialogue and cooperation in the context of a “complex and intertwined” international situation.
Relations between China and the UK deteriorated from 2020 when Beijing imposed a national security law on Hong Kong and cracked down on pro-democracy activists in the former British colony.
However, China remains Britain’s third-largest trading partner, and Starmer is hoping deals with Beijing will help fulfil his primary goal of boosting UK economic growth.
British pharmaceutical group AstraZeneca said on Thursday it would invest $15 billion in China through 2030 to expand its medicines manufacturing and research.
And China’s Pop Mart, makers of the wildly popular Labubu dolls, said it would set up a regional hub in London and open 27 stores across Europe in the coming year, including up to seven in Britain.
Starmer will continue his Asia trip with a brief stop in Japan on Saturday to meet Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi.
