Somali-run gun racket smashed

Three people, including a Kenyan detective, were shot dead on Wednesday when police smashed a major gun-smuggling racket headed by a Somali gun dealer, the Kenyan ‘Daily Nation’ said on Thursday. Muhammad Ali, a Somali national, was said to be an established gun runner who imported guns from Somalia and sold them to criminals through “a secret network of middlemen”, the ‘Nation’ said. Ali and a Kenyan detective were killed in a fierce gun-battle when police raided a hotel in the Nairobi suburb of Eastleigh - heavily populated by Kenyan Somalis and Somali nationals - and were confronted by bodyguards of the Somali gun dealer. A cache of 14 guns, including pistols and automatic rifles, and ammunition were seized.

The Nairobi provincial police chief, Geoffrey Muathe, told the press that
the Somali gun runner was caught when police posing as criminals lured Ali
by mobile phone into promises of a deal.

The Kenyan authorities have expressed repeated concern over the flow of small arms into Kenya from neighbouring Somalia ever since the collapse of the central government in 1991, and the lack of control at the borders. Senior police officials have complained of the increased used of small arms in Kenyan urban centres, as well as the easy availability of arms for pastoralist communities living near the border with Somalia, humanitarian sources told IRIN.