Kenyan airport officials brace for possible al-Shabaab attacks

Officials in Kenya have tightened airport security after receiving reports that terror group al-Shabaab plans to launch airborne suicide missions.

An internal memo leaked from the Kenya Airports Authority on Friday revealed the al-Qaeda-linked terror group has as many as 11 suicide bombers trained in Somalia and ready for deployment. The group plans to target Jomo Kenyatta International Airport and Wilson Airport in Nairobi, and the Moi International Airport in Mombasa.

Yatich Kangugo, Airports Authority managing director, said although the memo was released prematurely and still needs to be vetted by local security agencies, the country has raised the airport operational threat category to high alert.

“We wish to inform the general public that the aviation is very sensitive to all security matters,” Kangugo said in a written statement. “We take proactive action on any intelligence information however frivolous it may seem.”

Since its beginning in the southern and central regions of Somalia, al-Shabaab, has made several threats against sites in Kenya, Ethiopia, and even to the Mall of America, last year. But analysts warn unfulfilled threats doesn’t disprove the group’s ability to execute.

“They have a track record of making threats they aren’t always able to carry out that are basically bluffs,” said Joshua Meservey, a policy analyst on Africa and the Middle East at The Heritage Foundation. “But they unfortunately, also have a successful track record of attacks in Kenya and even beyond.”

The latest threat comes nearly a month after al-Shabaab took responsibility for an explosion on a passenger plane shortly after it took off from Somalia’s Mogadishu International Airport. The extremist group said the attack was part of an operation targeting Western intelligence officials and Turkish NATO forces.

Kenya remains a target of al-Shabaab due to the country’s increased involvement in AMISON, an African Union peacekeeping mission organized to combat the terror group. Last week, Somalia’s president revealed al-Shabaab killed more than 180 Kenyan soldiers, who were part of the peacekeeping mission, at their base in January.

“They find the Kenyan army’s involvement aimed at them,” said John Hirsch, senior adviser at the International Peace Institute. “Al-Shabaab has been in a retaliatory mode.”

Since its creation in 2007, AMISOM has been partly successful ousting al-Shabaab from Somalia’s capital, Mogadishu, and Kismayo, the country’s major port city. But with only about 22,000 troops, the mission has so far fallen short of completely defeating the terror group.

“The issue is AMISOM lacks the number of troops to keep pushing al-Shabaab,” Meservey said. “Once they expel al-Shabaab from these areas, they have to be able to hold those areas, provide security, and protect the people.”