GARISSA // Al Shabab has warned of more attacks in Kenya like the assault on Garissa University College in which 148 people were killed.
“Kenyan cities will run red with blood,” said the Somali extremist group, according to the SITE intelligence monitoring group.
In a statement issued on Shabab-affiliated websites and Twitter accounts, the militants said the Garissa attack was in retaliation for killings carried out by Kenyan troops who are fighting the group in Somalia.
“This will be a long, gruesome war of which you, the Kenyan public, are its first casualties,” said the group.
“No amount of precaution or safety measures will be able to guarantee your safety, thwart another attack or prevent another bloodbath.”
Authorities have arrested five people on suspicion of involvement in the attack, including two at the university itself.
Three others were arrested as they tried to cross into Somalia, interior ministry spokesman, Mwenda Njoka, said on Twitter. The three are associates of Mohamed Mohamud, also known as Dulyadin Gamadhere, a former teacher who authorities say coordinated the Garissa attack. Kenyan authorities have put up a US$220,000 (Dh808,004) bounty for information leading to Gamadhere’s arrest.
Meanwhile, a survivor of the massacre who hid in a wardrobe for two days, too terrified to come out, was rescued safely on Saturday, dehydrated but apparently unharmed.
Cynthia Cheroitich, a 19-year-old student, was rescued on Saturday morning, some 50 hours after the attack began. The gunmen were killed on Thursday evening.
She said she covered herself with clothes inside the wardrobe, refusing to emerge even when some of her classmates came out of hiding at the demands of the gunmen.
Kenyan troops searching the building on Saturday were alarmed when they heard sounds coming from inside the wardrobe.
But when police tried to rescue Ms Cheroitich, she refused to come out of her hiding place, suspecting at first that they were militants.
“How do I know that you are the Kenyan police?” she said she asked them.
Ms Cheroitich eventually left the wardrobe after a university lecturer she knew came to convince her that the rescuers were in fact police.
“She is the latest survivor, she has been hiding in a wardrobe for two days,” said a police officer involved in the security operation. “That is when she came out of the wardrobe and rushed to hospital.”
In hospital, Ms Cheroitich appeared tired and thirsty, sipping on yoghurt and a soft drink, but otherwise seemed in good health.
She said she drank a body lotion while hiding in the wardrobe because she was so thirsty and hungry.
“I was just praying to my God,” said Ms Cheroitich, who is a Christian.
Kenyan troops searching the building on Saturday were alarmed when they heard sounds coming from inside the wardrobe.
“She kept asking for reassurance from the security forces they were not Al-Shebab before she could come out,” the police officer said.
Four other survivors were also found on Friday.
In central Garissa on Saturday, authorities displayed the bodies of the alleged attackers before about 2,000 people in a large open area. The bodies lay on the back of a pickup truck that drove slowly past the crowd, with soldiers on standby. The crowd broke into a run in pursuit, shouting as the vehicle left the area.
Spectator Yusuf Mohamed applauded the display, saying authorities wanted to “win the hearts of the people” and clear any doubts that the attackers had been killed.
Kenyan authorities initially said the attackers had been strapped with explosives that went off like bombs when they were shot, but investigators later said there were no suicide vests. The four bodies shown Saturday had wounds but were intact.
The bodies of many of those killed in Garissa have been transported to the capital, Nairobi, where grieving Kenyans gathered to view the remains of family members.
* Associated Press and Agencr France-Presse