Kenyan Muslim Cleric Shot Dead
Abubakar Shariff is the third cleric to be killed in the port city of
Mombasa since 2012.
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| Abubakar Shariff was accused of supporting al-Shabab by the US and UN Security Council [AP] |
A prominent Muslim Kenyan cleric, accused by the United States and UN
Security Council of supporting the Somali rebel group al-Shabab, has
been killed on the Kenyan coast, a police officer at the scene and a witness
said.
"Our brother Abubakar Shariff Makaburi has left us. He is dead," a
preacher at a mosque in Kisauni, a Muslim-dominated area near Mombasa,
said through a loudspeaker on Tuesday night.
"May his soul rest in peace. He has died a brave death."
Makaburi was killed as he left a court compound about 15 km north of
the port city of Mombasa, police chief for Kisauni area Richard
Ngtia told journalists. Makaburi had been attending a court hearing.
Makaburi and another man were outside the court waiting to be picked
up when another vehicle approached and the men were sprayed with
bullets, he said. Both were killed.
A Reuters witness also identified the corpse, which appeared to have
bullet wounds to the body and head.
Dozens of supporters of the cleric gathered nearby demanding police
hand over the body.
Police fired in the air to disperse the crowd.
Makaburi's death could stir fresh unrest in the coastal area where
most of Kenya's Muslims live. Muslim youths clashed with police for
three days in February after a man was killed during a police raid on a
mosque used by firebrand preachers.
Kenyan police have dismissed accusations that they are to blame for
extra-judicial killings. Two other leading Muslic clerics have been
killed in the past two years.
The east African country, the region's largest economy, is still
reeling from an al-Shabab attack on a shopping mall in Nairobi in
September in which at least 67 people were killed.
Source: Reuters
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