Kenya kidnapping curtails UN aid work
- 13 years ago
Hunger, disease and bleak conditions make Dadaab a difficult place to live.
But since two Spanish aid workers were kidnapped from here on Thursday staff numbers are being cut and services reduced.
(SOUNDBITE) (English) UNHCR SPOKESPERSON, EMMANUEL NYABERA, SAYING:
"Today we have to hold everyone in base, we just have very thin staff that are going down to the camps with police patrol because some services cannot be suspended, but most of our colleagues, a number of our colleagues are currently just in base."
It's the third abduction of Westerners in Kenya by Somali attackers in a month.
Police suspect Somalia's al Shabaab insurgents are responsible, they deny the claim.
The Kenyan government is under increasing pressure to beef up defences along the Somali frontier or risk further damaging tourism, one of the country's top foreign currency earners.
Lily Grimes, Reuters
But since two Spanish aid workers were kidnapped from here on Thursday staff numbers are being cut and services reduced.
(SOUNDBITE) (English) UNHCR SPOKESPERSON, EMMANUEL NYABERA, SAYING:
"Today we have to hold everyone in base, we just have very thin staff that are going down to the camps with police patrol because some services cannot be suspended, but most of our colleagues, a number of our colleagues are currently just in base."
It's the third abduction of Westerners in Kenya by Somali attackers in a month.
Police suspect Somalia's al Shabaab insurgents are responsible, they deny the claim.
The Kenyan government is under increasing pressure to beef up defences along the Somali frontier or risk further damaging tourism, one of the country's top foreign currency earners.
Lily Grimes, Reuters