Tuesday, 17 June 2014

Kenya faces major security challenges

One of my colleagues at the UN, a man from a Nordic country, decided to retire by the Kenyan coast, not far from Mombasa. That decision was taken more than 10 years ago. The place was quiet and the weather much nicer than around the Baltic Sea. 

I thought of him and his wife today. The news coming from that part of Africa have not been good. And they have further deteriorated in the last couple of days. People have been massacred by extremists, others have been kidnapped. And above all, the national government seems too weak to be able to tackle the security challenges.

The dangerous situation shows once more that terrorism can spread fast if not properly contained. The chaos that prevails in Somalia, just to the North of Kenya, is a major menace to entire region. And of all the neighbouring countries, Kenya is the most exposed to the expansion of the Somali anarchy. 

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