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1 Killed, 2 Dozen Hurt When Security Drill in Kenya Sparks Stampede


Paramedics assist a woman injured during a security exercise Nov. 30, 2015, at Strathmore University in Kenya's capital Nairobi.
Paramedics assist a woman injured during a security exercise Nov. 30, 2015, at Strathmore University in Kenya's capital Nairobi.

One person died in Kenya on Monday when police conducted a security exercise at a campus in the capital Nairobi without informing the students ahead of time, sparking panic and a stampede.

Nairobi has been on heightened alert after bomb and gun attacks by Somali al Shabaab militants, such as the storming of Garissa University near the Somali border in April in which 147 people were killed and the 2013 Westgate mall attack in Nairobi when 67 were killed.

Strathmore University, a private institution near the city center, said one of its staff members died from injuries incurred in the stampede to get away from those carrying out the security drill.

More than two dozen others were injured and admitted to hospitals around the city, the university said.

One tutor at Strathmore said that students, who had not been informed about the security drill, panicked in fear that the exercise was another attack by al Shabaab militants.

"I heard two gunshots," she said. "Everyone started running, I grabbed whatever I could."

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    Reuters

    Reuters is a news agency founded in 1851 and owned by the Thomson Reuters Corporation based in Toronto, Canada. One of the world's largest wire services, it provides financial news as well as international coverage in over 16 languages to more than 1000 newspapers and 750 broadcasters around the globe.

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