Westgate shopping mall shooting
| Westgate shopping mall attack | |
|---|---|
Smoke over Westgate shopping mall on 23 September 2013
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| Location | Westlands, Nairobi, Kenya |
| Coordinates | 1°15′25″S 36°48′12″E / 1.25694°S 36.80333°ECoordinates: 1°15′25″S 36°48′12″E / 1.25694°S 36.80333°E |
| Date | 21 September 2013 (UTC+3) |
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Attack type
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Mass shooting, terrorism, siege |
| Weapons | AK-47s,grenades |
| Deaths | 71 (including 4 attackers) |
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Non-fatal injuries
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175 |
| Perpetrator | Al-Shabaab |
On Saturday 21 September 2013, unidentified gunmen attacked Westgate shopping mall, an upscale mall in Nairobi, Kenya. The attack resulted in at least 67 deaths, and more than 175 people were reportedly wounded in the mass shooting.
The extremist Islamic group al-Shabaab claimed responsibility for the incident, which it characterised as retribution for the Kenyan military's deployment in the group's home country of Somalia. Many media outlets also suspected the insurgent group's involvement in the attack based on earlier reprisal warnings it had issued in the wake of Operation Linda Nchi from 2011 to 2012.
Kenyan authorities arrested dozens of people in the aftermath of the attack, but had not announced any suspects directly related to the siege. On 4 November 2013, a Kenyan court charged four Somali nationals with harbouring the gunmen in their homes, with each pleading not guilty.
On 20 September 2015, Foreign Policy magazine reported the Westgate attack on 21 September lasted several hours, with the last victim killed before special Kenyan security forces entered the mall, which was also corroborated by New York City Police Department,HBO, and United States Army. The mall was officially declared secured on 24 September.
The incident followed threats from Al-Shabaab in late 2011 of attacks in Kenya in retaliation for Operation Linda Nchi, a coordinated military operation in southern Somalia that was launched against the group by the Somali Armed Forces and Kenya Defence Forces. One week before the incident and a month after United Nations warnings of possible attacks, Kenyan police claimed to have disrupted a major attack in its final stages of planning after arresting two people with grenades, AK-47 assault rifles, and suicide vests packed with ball bearings. The two suspects were from a Nairobi neighbourhood where Somali immigrants live. A manhunt was also launched for eight more suspects.The Sunday Telegraph claimed that it had seen United Nations documents that warned that in the previous month the threat of an "attempted large-scale attack" in Kenya was "elevated." After the incident, Nairobi senator Mike Sonko claimed that he had warned the security services of a possible attack three months previously. The country was celebrating the International Day of Peace when the incident took place.
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Wikipedia