Four charged over Kenya mall attack

Four people have been charged over the terrorist attack on Westgate Mall in Kenya, which killed 67 people.

Charges against the four Somali nationals include harbouring a fugitive and illegally registering as a Kenyan. The charges had to be read to the defendants in Somali by a translator.

Mohamed Ahmed Abdi, Liban Abdullah Omar, Hussein Hassan Mustafah, and Adan Dheq have been imprisoned until a court hearing next week. All four pleaded not guilty.

Authorities have detained dozens of people since of the four-day mall siege, but had not said any suspects were directly related to the attack. It’s unclear how many arrests have been made.

The Somali Islamic extremist group al-Shabab claimed responsibility for the attack and said it was in retaliation for Kenya's deployment of troops in southern Somalia.

Abdi, Omar and Mustafah were charged with knowingly supporting Mohammed Abdinur Said and Hassan Dhohullow and others identified as perpetrators of the terrorist attack.

Dheq was accusing of harboring terror suspects. Authorities said a mosque in Nairobi’s Somali neighborhood of Eastleigh knowingly harbored Abdikadir Hared Mohammed, a terror suspect.

The four are due back in court on November 11th.

Agencies