Advertisement

We need your help now

Support from readers like you keeps The Journal open.

You are visiting us because we have something you value. Independent, unbiased news that tells the truth. Advertising revenue goes some way to support our mission, but this year it has not been enough.

If you've seen value in our reporting, please contribute what you can, so we can continue to produce accurate and meaningful journalism. For everyone who needs it.

An August 2011 photo of part of the refugee camp in Dadaab, Kenya. AP Photo/Schalk van Zuydam/PA Images

Vehicle found during search for Spanish aid workers

The MSF employees were kidnapped from the world’s largest refugee camp in Kenya by gunmen believed to be part of Somalia’s al-Shabab militant group.

Updated 3.30pm

A VEHICLE HAS been found during the search for two Spanish women working with the aid agency Medécins Sans Frontieres (Doctors Without Borders).

They were abducted from a refugee camp in Kenya by gunmen believed to be part of the Somali militant group al-Shabab.

A third person, the aid workers’ Kenyan driver, was injured during the abduction. He has been hospitalised and is understood to be in stable condition.

Kenyan security forces hunting for Somali gunmen and the kidnapped aid workers found their vehicle abandoned and mired in the desert as aid agencies scaled back relief operations in the world’s biggest refugee camp Friday in response to the abduction there.

Kenya has deployed troops and six helicopters to try to rescue the pair, who apparently have been forced to continue on foot with their captors. They had been headed toward Somalia.

The UN temporarily suspended all non-lifesaving aid operations in the Dadaab refugee camp following yesterday’s kidnapping of the two workers from MSF, a spokeswoman said.

Hundreds of staff are confined to their offices, forcing the cancellation of services like education, counseling and relocation of families until further notice.

“Only water, food and health services are being maintained,” said UN refugee agency spokeswoman Needa Jehu-Hoyah. “This will of course have an impact on the poor refugees.”

MSF Spain president José Antonio Bastos said in a statement that the organisation strongly condemns the attack – the third kidnapping of Europeans in Kenya in the past six weeks - and has set up a crisis team to deal with the incident.

“MSF is in contact with all the relevant authorities and is doing all it can to ensure the swift and safe return of our colleagues. Meanwhile, our thoughts are with them and with their families in this difficult time,” he said.

Regional police chief Leo Nyongesa said the attackers fled towards Somalia with the two women and that police are tracking the group by road and by air.

The hijacked vehicle got stuck about 30 kilometres from the Somali border because of rain and bad terrain, said a police official in a position to know but who could not be identified because of agency rules.

Police suspect the gunmen may have then forced the women to walk on foot, the official said.

He also said that the border has been closed, but the Kenya-Somali border is known for being poorly-patrolled and militia fighters and Kenyan soldiers have had little difficulty in crossing over and back.

The Dadaab camp is the largest refugee camp in the world, holding around 500,000 Somalis who have fled famine and fighting at home.

Al-Shabab’s threats against foreign aid agencies and staff have forced organisations to withdraw their international staff in recent years. The militant group recently renewed its threats against the workers when agencies appealed for safe passage while providing aid during the ongoing food crisis.

Goal’s John O’Shea called on the UN to provide protection for aid workers, and the Somali government recently banned foreign aid workers from delivering aid in areas controlled by the militants due to the high threat of kidnapping.

- Additional reporting by the AP

Column: Inside Somalia: How violence is trapping the starving >

Read: All sides to blame in Somali disaster, says human rights group >

Readers like you are keeping these stories free for everyone...
A mix of advertising and supporting contributions helps keep paywalls away from valuable information like this article. Over 5,000 readers like you have already stepped up and support us with a monthly payment or a once-off donation.

Close
6 Comments
    Install the app to use these features.
    Mute The Galway Crusader
    Favourite The Galway Crusader
    Report
    Jan 22nd 2021, 4:15 PM

    What will they be basing the calculated Grades on? These students won’t have done any 5th year exams (due to Covid this last year) and no mock LC (from Covid this year).
    99% of LC students in a regular year would take your hand off for calculated grades. The State Examinations commission need to start planning for an open book exam rather than teachers handing out grades with little to no basis for the result given

    69
    Install the app to use these features.
    Mute Sean Higgins
    Favourite Sean Higgins
    Report
    Jan 22nd 2021, 4:54 PM

    @The Galway Crusader: There is only one viable solution. Rock, Paper, Scissors.

    32
    Install the app to use these features.
    Mute Thomas Armstrong
    Favourite Thomas Armstrong
    Report
    Jan 22nd 2021, 5:52 PM

    @The Galway Crusader: I agree 100% with you. They haven’t sat down and done a Final end year exam since there 2nd year 3rd was their Junior exam a State exam and none of these can be used. I know they sat 2 Christmas exams but what could be asked of them in each of these test exams. Have they completed even 8months of schooling since all Lockdown’s. Home schooling is new to them unless you are a border. They go to the study hall each night and I say would find it easier to adopt than day students. I do think they have to seat the Leaving but I do fear for them unless they study pass papers in their courses it may be the only way for them to get thegrade they need if the exams are held in June.

    8
    Install the app to use these features.
    Mute Declan Doherty
    Favourite Declan Doherty
    Report
    Jan 22nd 2021, 4:49 PM

    Good on Reuben Murray. That young man would run rings around the minister with his mature approach to this situation. She should take note. The LC isn’t going to happen. We just need Norma to wake up and realise that.

    42
    Install the app to use these features.
    Mute Tony Gordon
    Favourite Tony Gordon
    Report
    Jan 22nd 2021, 4:45 PM

    Junior certs student THE FORGOTTEN
    No info on mocks and juniors cert, children facing into state exam for the first time don’t even get a mention, no dates, no update NOTHING.

    it isn’t just leaving cert students.

    30
    Install the app to use these features.
    Mute Jonnie Marre
    Favourite Jonnie Marre
    Report
    Jan 22nd 2021, 4:48 PM

    @Tony Gordon: junior cert is irrelevant! Forget it! It won’t happen and should be scrapped fully anyway.

    79
    Install the app to use these features.
    Mute Tony Gordon
    Favourite Tony Gordon
    Report
    Jan 22nd 2021, 6:19 PM

    @Jonnie Marre: I’m glad you think having a child locked up going through the exact same experience as someone heading into the leaving cert, stressed out of their minds irrelevant.

    Sure who cares about them.

    12
    Install the app to use these features.
    Mute Jules
    Favourite Jules
    Report
    Jan 22nd 2021, 4:43 PM

    It makes more sense to move to a continuous assessment model. Perhaps the journal could run a poll on the topic, just a suggestion.

    29
    Install the app to use these features.
    Mute Lydia McLoughlin
    Favourite Lydia McLoughlin
    Report
    Jan 22nd 2021, 5:04 PM

    @Jules: agreed as next years leaving is also going to be affected here at this rate.

    20
    Install the app to use these features.
    Mute Maria Heraty
    Favourite Maria Heraty
    Report
    Jan 22nd 2021, 4:50 PM

    Why not do an exam as planned but half the curriculum….if they have 30 chapters do the first 15 chapters and same for every subject ….. at lease half the pressure but still some form of an exam in the end …. to much missed school for the normal LC to go ahead

    17
    Install the app to use these features.
    Mute Eoghan Joyce
    Favourite Eoghan Joyce
    Report
    Jan 22nd 2021, 6:23 PM

    @Maria Heraty: chapters? The days of teaching directly out of the book are long gone, thankfully.

    13
    Install the app to use these features.
    Mute Thomas Armstrong
    Favourite Thomas Armstrong
    Report
    Jan 22nd 2021, 6:25 PM

    @Maria Heraty: Would the student’s still have to answer the same amount of questions or half plus you would be taking away half of the curriculum that more then likely would be a favorite for a lot of students and be banking on answering 1 or 2 questions on those. I fear this question won’t be answered today or by the Minister if your idea was presented but its a start. I would like to see our teachers & TD’s do what you just did “Give an alternative”

    4
    Install the app to use these features.
    Mute Dino Manning
    Favourite Dino Manning
    Report
    Jan 22nd 2021, 5:13 PM

    The junior cert is gone! It’s junior cycle now! All higher and ordinary gone in all subjects except for maths English and Irish and even they have been made easier! Only common level in all the others! Sure it’s only a joke of a thing nowadays

    17
    Install the app to use these features.
    Mute Tony Gordon
    Favourite Tony Gordon
    Report
    Jan 22nd 2021, 6:17 PM

    @Dino Manning: Like you to say that to a stressed out teen.

    7
    Install the app to use these features.
    Mute John Donnelly
    Favourite John Donnelly
    Report
    Jan 22nd 2021, 8:16 PM

    No child should be stressed out about Junior Cert, where is the stress coming from?

    12
    Install the app to use these features.
    Mute Joan O'Boyle Mitchell
    Favourite Joan O'Boyle Mitchell
    Report
    Jan 22nd 2021, 9:33 PM

    In the North at the end of 5th year you do an exam on everything you studied that year, then that course work is over. In 6th year you study second half of A level and do exams at end of that year. 5th year exams called As and are then added together to give an overall A level mark. If for some reason you drop out after 5th year you still have a qualification.

    So it’s kind of like semesterisation that happens at plc and some Uni’s

    8
    Install the app to use these features.
    Mute Edward Ucator
    Favourite Edward Ucator
    Report
    Jan 22nd 2021, 7:47 PM

    Just a heads up, as an examiner I’d have received my application for this year by now from the SEC. They haven’t sent me anything yet. What do you make of that?

    8
    Install the app to use these features.
    Mute Watchful Axe
    Favourite Watchful Axe
    Report
    Jan 22nd 2021, 6:59 PM

    You’d have to feel sorry for them, it’s basically an early experience of what third level is like, getting new material right up to the death fired at you in notes. On a normal year, most good teachers would have their subject fully covered before the mocks bar one or two bits.

    5
    Install the app to use these features.
    Mute Seeking Truth
    Favourite Seeking Truth
    Report
    Jan 23rd 2021, 10:06 AM

    Could they possibly do in-school mocks in April to build on their calculated grades, and then see about the actual Leaving Cert?

    1
Submit a report
Please help us understand how this comment violates our community guidelines.
Thank you for the feedback
Your feedback has been sent to our team for review.
JournalTv
News in 60 seconds