Italian kidnapped by gunmen in Kenya

Assailants have kidnapped an Italian woman and wounded at least five people on Kenya's coast, police said on Wednesday. The attack took place at the Chakama trading center in the Kilifi area.

National Police Chief Joseph Boinnet said the incident took place around 8 p.m. local time on Tuesday when the gunmen armed with AK-47s began shooting indiscriminately.

They also "abducted an Italian lady aged 23 years who is a volunteer of Africa Milele Onlus, an NGO operating in the area," the National Police Service wrote on Twitter.

"The European lady got out of her room, instead of lying on the ground, to enquire what was going on. One of the attackers then slapped her," a witness told Kenyan broadcaster KTN News. "Their aim was to get money but they took off with her to the river and, before leaving the village, they started shooting in the air and they shot one woman and four boys." 

Later, witnesses told reporters that the assailants appeared to target the Italian woman. Her charity, Africa Milele Onlus, sponsors educational programs and cultural activities for orphans, according to its Facebook page.

Officers said that the wounded, who were all under the age of 25, had been taken to a hospital and that police were in pursuit of the attackers. Authorities confirmed that three of the injured were children, including a 10-year-old boy.

Motive unconfirmed

Kenyan officials have not yet confirmed a motive for the violence. While Islamist militants from al-Shabab, based in neighboring Somalia, have routinely launched attacks in Kenya in recent years, they usually do so in regions immediately bordering Somalia.

The deadliest al-Shabab attack came in 2013, when 70 people were killed in an assault on the Westgate shopping mall in Nairobi. The militants have also been known to kidnap foreigners off Kenya's coast, promoting Kenyan military involvement in Somalia that the Islamists have used as an excuse to mount retaliatory attacks.

Although attacks on foreigners are relatively rare, they can have a devastating effect on Kenya's crucial tourism industry.

es/sms (AP, Reuters)