Mother and daughter arrested with sophisticated weapons

Police on Wednesday arrested two women with a cache of firearms in Nairobi.

The mother and daughter were arrested in Racecourse, Dagoretti Corner during a raid.

The Directorate of Criminal Investigations said they suspect the weapons were sneaked into the country for terror activities.

The seized weapons include M4 sniper rifle, four pistols, a close-quarter Uzi submachine gun and an assortment of over 3,700 bullets.

The suspects are custody as police seek more time to conduct investigations and carry out ballistic examination on the cache.

An M4 sniper rifle is used by the NATO forces battling Taliban in Afghanistan, this American origin rifle has a 14.5 inches (370 mm) barrel and a telescoping stock. It is essentially a lighter and shorter variant of the M16A2 assault rifle.

Uzi submachine gun, compact automatic weapon, is used throughout the world as a police and special-forces firearm and is named after its designer Uziel Gal, an Israeli army officer who developed it after the Arab-Israeli war of 1948. The weapon was phased out by the Israeli army in 2003.

The arrests come two weeks after police issued a terror attack warning and asked Kenyans to look out for a Mr Rashid Mwalimu, whom they suspect will use his expertise as a pilot to carry out an aviation-linked attack on Kenya.

Mr Rashid, security authorities say, is currently in Somalia planning an attack on Kenya. The public has been urged to help the police with any information regarding his whereabouts should they see him for his immediate arrest.

 “He is wanted by the Anti-Terrorism Police. He is a trained pilot on a mission to carry out aviation attacks. Currently, he is in Somalia and is planning on how to sneak back into Kenya. If seen, report to any nearest security agency,” police said in an alert issued two weeks ago.

Al-Shaabab, the terror group based in Somalia, has been on the receiving end of continuous airstrikes on its bases that has left several commanders dead. Kenyan security agencies now believe that the militant group is planning airstrikes to avenge the deaths of their colleagues, adding that it has trained pilots to carry this out.

Last month, three suspects were arrested and eight AK-47 rifles, 2,bullets, eight magazines and 20 litres of petrol seized by police in Garissa County.

North Eastern regional Commissioner Nicodemus Ndalana said the suspects were heavily armed and investigations had already been launched to unmask their motives.

“The suspects were heavily armed but we arrested them and we have them in our cells. I will personally lead the team to ensure we conduct proper investigations on this matter,” Ndalana said.

He added that they wanted to know the source of the weapon, the transporters, who ordered them and their intentions so that they secure a solid case against them in court.

The three were arrested along the Baraki – Maalmin road, Lagdera sub-county by police who were on their way to a National Police Reservists (NPR) post who spotted the three men in a white Toyota Succeed car registration number KCY 953L.

According to police, Abdirizack Mohamed (24), Jimale Abey Mahamud (21) and Nur Ibrahim Alasow (30) behaved suspiciously when they were told to pull over their vehicle but instead drove into the nearby bushes to avoid police check.