LONDON – Prime minister says west must help Somalis build a stable future or conflict-ridden country’s problems will continue to reoccur. The world has reached a turning point in helping Somalis reclaim their country, David Cameron said on Thursday, as he opened a conference in London aimed at restoring stability to a country riven by [...]

BAIDOA – Somalia government soldiers along with Ethiopian forces took over the control of parts of Baidoa town, a strategic stronghold of Islamist militants in western Somalia, an official said on Wednesday. Mohamed Ibrahim Habsade, a parliamentarian confirmed to Shabelle Media by phone while he was at the fighting zone that TFG soldiers backed by [...]

Al-Shabaab militants yesterday destroyed business billboards with non-Arabic scripts at Eelasha Biyaha Area, a strip of land in the southern outskirts of Mogadishu, where most people who fled the wars in the Somali capital had set up shelter and businesses. The masked fighters stated that businesses in the affected area were ordered to remove English [...]

President Kibaki on Wednesday directed that a State funeral be held in honour of the late Nobel laureate Wangari Maathai. The Head of State also declared two days of national mourning on Thursday and Friday during which flags will be flown at half-mast. (READ: Nobel peace laureate Wangari Maathai dies in Nairobi) Prof Maathai, 71, [...]

Kenyan troops and aircraft crossed the border into Somalia on Sunday afternoon on the hunt for al-Shabaab militants who are behind a recent spate of kidnappings on Kenyan soil. Al-Shabaab’s cross-border raids have angered and frightened Kenya, who can’t afford any more knocks to their fragile economy, and they are responding with an unprecedented show [...]

The Provincial Administration in Garissa county yesterday declared war on parents who neglect their children with disability. Lower Northeastern Regional Commissioner Hassan Farah ordered all DCs, Dos and chiefs to carry out an operation in homesteads and arrest any parent found keeping a disabled child at home. Speaking while giving wheel chairs to 29 people [...]

GARISSA/WAJIR SOUTH, 28 September 2011 (IRIN) – Gains made in bringing education closer to children from pastoralist families in northern Kenya could be eroded by the ongoing drought, which has especially affected high-school attendance. “All the 72 secondary schools in North Eastern [Province], with about 20,000 students, are facing very tough challenges,” Adan Sheikh, the [...]

No one is safe in these regions, not even the police officers sent to keep law and order. But the Government appears to be doing little to safeguard its population from outside aggression, writes JOHN OYWA Wherever they live death looms. No matter the kind of guarantees they get from the Government, these Kenyans are [...]

Civil service boss Francis Muthaura’s team sought to paint the violence in Naivasha and Nakuru as having been triggered by displaced people who sought refuge in the area. Taking to the witness stand, Kilifi district commissioner Katee Mwanza, who served in Naivasha at the height of the clashes, claimed a flood of displaced people brought [...]

World leaders have paid tribute to Nobel Laureate Wangari Maathai who passed away while having treatment for ovarian cancer on Monday. Archbishop Desmond Tutu praised Maathai as a true “visionary African woman” and called her a “leading voice on the continent.” He said: “Professor Maathai introduced the idea of women planting trees in Kenya to [...]

The Kenyan shilling traded at a new low of 101.0 against the dollar on Monday, driven weaker by strong dollar demand from importers, telecoms and energy companies, traders said.”Corporates are really buying (dollars). It’s not been a single big ticket but telecoms, oil importers, retailers. It’s across the board,” said Dickson Magecha, a trader at [...]

Somali refugees in Hagardera refugee camp forming part of the larger Dadaab refugee complex in northern Kenya are complaining of increasing insecurity in their camps. Hagardera refugee camp peace committee chairman, Ahmed Mohamud Mohamed told Bar-kulan that security situation in the camp is going out of hand. He said armed gangs have just recently hijacked [...]