Six students among 7 killed in Kenya high school shooting

The gunmen were looking for the principal and a suspended student, couldn’t find them and then shot the students: police

October 14, 2017 04:52 pm | Updated 06:48 pm IST - NAIROBI (KENYA):

Google Maps image locates Lokichogio town near Kenya’s border with South Sudan.

Google Maps image locates Lokichogio town near Kenya’s border with South Sudan.

Gunmen suspected to be from neighboring South Sudan shot dead seven people, including six students, in a raid on a high school early Saturday that appeared to be a revenge attack, a Kenya police official said.

The shooting occurred at dawn at Lokichogio Mixed Secondary School near the countries’ border, Rift Valley regional criminal investigations chief Gideon Kibunja said.

A key suspect is a senior at the school, who was suspended last week after he was found fighting and vowed to take revenge, Mr. Kibunja has said.

The gunmen were looking for the school’s principal and the student involved in the fight but couldn’t find them, so they shot other students out of frustration, he said.

Not the first such incident

The shooting comes a month after a high school girl was charged with murdering nine of her colleagues in a fire at a Nairobi boarding school.

Kenya’s border areas are littered with firearms from neighboring countries that have experienced war, including South Sudan and Somalia. High schools have experienced a wave of violent incidents in the past two years.

0 / 0
Sign in to unlock member-only benefits!
  • Access 10 free stories every month
  • Save stories to read later
  • Access to comment on every story
  • Sign-up/manage your newsletter subscriptions with a single click
  • Get notified by email for early access to discounts & offers on our products
Sign in

Comments

Comments have to be in English, and in full sentences. They cannot be abusive or personal. Please abide by our community guidelines for posting your comments.

We have migrated to a new commenting platform. If you are already a registered user of The Hindu and logged in, you may continue to engage with our articles. If you do not have an account please register and login to post comments. Users can access their older comments by logging into their accounts on Vuukle.