Vehicles ablaze in Nairobi as Kenya protests escalate
Riot police officers walk past burning vehicles during a demonstration against the death of a blogger in police custody last week, in downtown Nairobi, Kenya June 12, 2025. REUTERS/Thomas Mukoya
NAIROBI (Reuters) - Protests in the Kenyan capital Nairobi intensified on Thursday, with vehicles set ablaze and police firing teargas to disperse crowds angered by the death in custody of a political blogger last week, Reuters TV footage showed.
The death of 31-year-old Albert Ojwang, who blogged on political and social issues, is the latest case to throw a spotlight on the country's security services, who have been accused of extrajudicial killings and enforced disappearances for years.
Police used teargas to disperse hundreds of protesters in the capital, with at least two vehicles set on fire, Reuters TV footage showed, a day after President William Ruto said Ojwang had died "at the hands of the police", reversing earlier official accounts of his death.
Police had initially said Ojwang was arrested in western Kenya on Friday for allegedly defaming the country's deputy police chief Eliud Lagat online and died "after hitting his head against a cell wall".
The Independent Policing Oversight Authority watchdog has launched an investigation, while the European Union and the United States have called for a transparent probe into the blogger's death.
Protesters demanded Lagat's resignation on Thursday, with some carrying Kenyan flags and chanting "Lagat must go".
The blogger's wounds, including a head injury, neck compression and soft tissue damage, pointed to assault as the cause of death, according to pathologist Bernard Midia, who was part of a team that conducted an autopsy.
On Wednesday, Police Inspector General Douglas Kanja apologised for the police having previously implied that Ojwang died by suicide.
"Based on the report by IPOA ... it is not true... He did not hit his head against the wall," Kanja told a Senate hearing.
(Reporting by Jefferson Kahinju and Nelson Aruya; Writing by Ammu Kannampilly; Editing by Bate Felix and Hugh Lawson)
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
The Star
an hour ago
- The Star
Trump allowed to keep National Guard in Los Angeles as more protests planned
National Guard members keep watch outside the Edward R. Roybal Federal Building, during a protest against federal immigration sweeps, in Los Angeles, California, U.S., June 12, 2025. REUTERS/David Swanson LOS ANGELES (Reuters) -U.S. President Donald Trump can keep his deployment of National Guard troops in Los Angeles, according to a court ruling, as protests against immigration raids look set to enter their second week in the strongest backlash since his return to power in January. Trump on Friday welcomed the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals' decision that temporarily paused a lower court ruling that blocked the mobilization, although it does not mean that the court will ultimately agree to side with him. "We saved L.A. Thank you for the Decision!!!" Trump wrote on his Truth Social platform. Cities across the United States were bracing for more demonstrations especially on Saturday, when those also opposed to a weekend military parade in Washington marking the U.S. Army's 250th anniversary are expected to take to the streets. "They've defied our courts, deported Americans, disappeared people off the streets, attacked our civil rights, and slashed our services," the group No Kings, which is behind the day of action, wrote on its website. A battalion of 700 U.S. Marines was expected to arrive on Friday in Los Angeles, marking an extraordinary use of military forces to support civilian police operations within the United States. Troops have stood guard at a federal detention center in the city's downtown where many of the protests have taken place in a show of solidarity for immigrants detained inside. The protests so far have been mostly peaceful, punctuated by incidents of violence, and restricted to a few city blocks. Demonstrations have also taken place in other U.S. cities this week including New York and Chicago. The guard had also accompanied Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents on operations to detain immigrants. Democratic leaders in California have strongly opposed the ramping up of immigration enforcement since it began last Friday. "Peace begins with ICE leaving Los Angeles," Mayor Karen Bass, who has imposed a nighttime curfew over one square mile (2.5 square km) of downtown Los Angeles, said on Thursday. Trump is carrying out a campaign promise to deport immigrants, employing forceful tactics consistent with the norm-breaking political style that got him elected twice. Democrats have said that the use of military force was unnecessary and an example of Trump's authoritarianism. Americans are divided over Trump's decision to activate the military. A Reuters/Ipsos poll released on Thursday showed that 48% of respondents agreed with a statement that the president should "deploy the military to bring order to the streets" when protests turned violent, while 41% disagreed. (Writing by Costas Pitas; Editing by Mary Milliken and Mark Porter)
The Star
an hour ago
- The Star
From a Russian prison, US schoolteacher tells lawyers he was grabbed by Moscow's soldiers
FILE PHOTO: Stephen Hubbard, a U.S. citizen accused of fighting as a mercenary for Ukraine against Russia in the course of a military conflict, is seen inside an enclosure for defendants on a screen during a video link to a hearing in a court building in Moscow, Russia October 7, 2024. REUTERS/Maxim Shemetov/File Photo LONDON (Reuters) -A 73-year-old American jailed by Russia as a mercenary for Ukraine protested his innocence when his U.S.-based legal team and family finally tracked him down in April, months after he vanished into the vast Russian prison system, they said. Stephen Hubbard, a retired schoolteacher, was sentenced last October to almost seven years in a penal colony after a court found him guilty of serving in a Ukrainian territorial defence unit against Russian forces, tasked with manning a checkpoint. Russian state media reported that he had entered a guilty plea in the closed-door trial. The U.S. Embassy in Moscow has not been granted consular access to Hubbard, a State Department spokesperson said, adding that U.S. officials have requested his immediate release. Martin De Luca, his U.S.-based lawyer, told Reuters it was not until this April that his legal team learned Hubbard was being held in a facility in the Mordovia region, east of Moscow. "The first thing Hubbard wanted to talk about when he was able to make contact with the outside world was: 'It's not true,'" said De Luca, who made his first public comments on the case to the New York Times this week. "They (Russian soldiers) grabbed him from his house. He was not in any combat or military unit", De Luca recalled Hubbard saying. Joseph Coleman, a son from Hubbard's first marriage who lives in Cyprus, said he spoke to his father in prison by phone for less than five minutes on May 28. "He did sound a little down," Coleman told Reuters. "He said, 'I'm tired of being a slave.'" At least eight other Americans are currently imprisoned in Russia, which has stepped up arrests of alleged mercenaries for Ukraine since its 2022 invasion of its neighbour. But Hubbard is the only one designated by the U.S. as "wrongfully detained," making him a top candidate to be returned in any future prisoner exchange. The Kremlin said last month the two sides were discussing a possible swap involving nine people on each side. A document written on the letterhead of the IK-12 penal colony, signed by a prison official and seen by Reuters, says that Hubbard is incarcerated there. Russia's federal prison service did not respond to an emailed request for confirmation from Reuters. Other U.S. citizens previously jailed in Russia have been incarcerated in the same region. VIDEO CLUES Hubbard, a Michigan native who taught English abroad for decades, had moved to Izium in eastern Ukraine in 2014 to be with a Ukrainian girlfriend, but by 2022 he was living there alone, his family said. Russian forces captured Izium in April 2022. After his arrest, his family struggled to establish what had happened to him. They caught glimpses of him in videos posted online in pro-war Russian Telegram channels. One showed what appeared to be a staged interrogation. In another, Hubbard appeared with his hands zip-tied and whimpered as a man slapped him with a plastic sandal. His sister, Patricia Hubbard Fox, identified her brother in both videos in conversations with Reuters. The agency could not verify when and where the videos were taken. "He is so non-military," Hubbard Fox told Reuters last year, expressing doubt that her brother would have taken up arms for any state. "He never had a gun, owned a gun, done any of that... He's more of a pacifist." TRACKING HIM DOWN After Hubbard's trial, De Luca and his team at a U.S. law firm began working to secure his release. They picked up the case in late February. It wasn't easy to find him, De Luca said. "Russia is still a functioning country. There are laws, bureaucracies, processes that get followed," he said. The team located Hubbard at the penal colony in Molochnitsa, a very small town about a seven-hour drive from Moscow. De Luca said the team has been able to call Hubbard three times since April. He described him as weak after months living in a prisoner-of-war camp. (Reporting by Lucy Papachristou; Editing by Philippa Fletcher)
The Star
an hour ago
- The Star
FARC guerrilla dissidents deny being behind senator's attack
FILE PHOTO: An image of Colombian Senator Miguel Uribe Turbay of the opposition Democratic Center party is displayed, after he was shot during a campaign event, in Bogota, Colombia, June 10, 2025. REUTERS/Luisa Gonzalez/File Photo
