HRW warns Kenya of abuse in Somalia

The Kenyan military may have mistreated prisoners at home and in Somalia during its fight against al-Shabaab, Human Rights Watch suggested. Kenyan forces stormed Somalia in October following a series of high-profile kidnappings of Westerners from the border regions. The move came as al-Shabaab, a militant group with ties to al-Qaida, started to regroup in the south of the country. Human Rights Watch said it had evidence Kenyan forces may have launched attacks that harmed civilians in the region and mistreated prisoners in Somalia and in Kenya. "Kenya's Somalia operation has resulted in apparent attacks on a camp for displaced people and a fishing boat," Daniel Bekele, Africa director at Human Rights Watch, said in a statement. "Kenya needs to find out exactly what happened and make sure that those responsible for any wrongdoing are punished appropriately." Somalia said it wanted the help of major military powers like the United States as it struggled to gain leverage against al-Shabaab militants, who at one point controlled most of Mogadishu. Troops from Djibouti will join the 9,000 members of the African Union peacekeeping mission in Somalia. The AU aims to roughly double the number of troops backing the Somali government.