Accessibility links

Breaking News
News

Britain Suspends All Flights to Kenya - 2003-05-15

update

Britain has suspended all flights to and from Kenya due to terrorist threats.

The unusual move has been made because of what Britain's Transportation Department calls the possibility of an imminent attack against British civil aviation interests in Kenya.

The announcement came just hours after Kenyan authorities said they had information that one of the suspects indicted for the bombing of the U.S. embassies in Nairobi and Dar es Salaam five years ago is planning another attack.

Al-Qaida suspect Fazul Abdullah Mohammed is thought to be back in Kenya, and the head of the anti-terrorism police unit there says his department has learned that some form of attack is planned and the threat must be taken seriously.

Earlier Thursday, the U.S. State Department urged American citizens to postpone non-essential travel to Kenya. The alert specifically mentions the possibility of shoulder-fired missiles being shot at aircraft, as terrorists did last November in the Kenyan city of Mombasa. But they missed.

Kenya called the British flight ban 'extreme.'

XS
SM
MD
LG