Kenya bombs al Shabaab targets after Garissa massacre

The Kenyan air force has launched air strikes on two camps operated by the Islamist group al Shabaab in Somalia, the army said Monday, in the first major military response to last week’s massacre at a Kenyan university.

Warplanes attacked the two al Shabaab positions, in the Gedo region of Somalia close to the Kenyan border, on Sunday afternoon and early Monday morning, said Col. David Obonyo of the Kenyan military,

"The two targets were hit and taken out, the two camps are destroyed,” he said.

Gunmen from the al Qaeda-aligned al Shabaab killed 148 people on Thursday when they stormed the Garissa University College campus, some 200 km (120 miles) from the Somali border.

Kenyan President Uhuru Kenyatta had vowed harsh measures against the militants in response.

However, the air strikes were “part of continuing operations, not just in response to Garissa”, said Obonyo.

Kenya has struggled to stop the flow of al Shabaab militants and weapons across its porous 700 km border with Somalia.

The country has troops in Somalia as part of an African Union force to attack al Shabaab and shore up the beleaguered Somali government.

African Union troops, including those from Kenya, carried out arrests and seized ammunitions in a militant camp in Gondodowe last August.

Al Shabaab, which has killed more than 400 people in Kenya since April 2013, has said Thursday’s attack on Garissa University College was a reprisal for Kenya sending troops into Somalia.