United States military drones on Thursday evening killed a senior Al Shabaab leader and one of the architects of the three most brutal terrorist attacks in Kenya in a precision strike targeting a convoy of vehicles he was traveling in.
Adan Garar, the man implicated in the two Mandera bus and quarry massacres, a vehicle intercepted with explosives at a police station in Mombasa and the September 21, 2013 Westgate Shopping Mall, in which sixty seven people died was killed in a drone strike on carried out by US military in Baradhere inside Somalia.
Two other senior Al Shabaab leaders were also killed in the drone attack that hit a convoy of two vehicles in which they were traveling alongside Garar who was in charge of Amniyat's external operations.
The suspected terrorists’ killing was coordinated by both US and Kenyan military intelligence who shared crucial information in tracking down the terror mastermind.
Garar and other Westgate Shopping Mall attack architects have been on the run for the last one and half years.They were, however, tracked and located by US military who decided to eliminate him deep inside enemy territory.
Garar is the second Amniyat's external operations boss to be killed in as many months after Yusuf Dheeq his predecessor was killed in early February in another drone attack in Dinsoor in Southern Somalia.
US drones are said to have hit a vehicle carrying Al Shabaab leaders in Baradhere within Somalia killing the occupants.
Kenyan security agents have been tracking down Garar who last year sneaked an SUV full of explosives through Mandera to Mombasa and abandoned it at Changamwe police station where hit was recovered before it went off.
He is also implicated in the spate of Improvised Explosive Device (IED) and grenade explosions in Mandera area. His movements have under the scrutiny of Kenyan security agents.
Eyewitnesses said that Al Shabaab fighters cordoned off the scene of attack where the extensively damaged vehicle with its casualties we're still on location.
Military sources both at AMISOM and US confirmed the attack but declined to give any details of the drone attack.
President Uhuru Kenyatta, then vowed to avenge the killing of innocent Kenyans a said they attackers would be tracked wherever they will be and made to pay for the heinous act.
Kenya Defence Force (KDF)
troops who have been in Somalia since October 2011 have coordinating their operations along with the Military Intelligence and the National Intelligence Service, to track down and neutralize the perpetrators of terrorist activities in both Kenya and Somalia.
The entry of KDF into Somalia has helped change the game in the former war torn country in the Operation Linda Nchi which then metamorphosed into a fully fledged AMISOM operation.