Kenya's president says he fired police unit boss over killings

NAIROBI, Kenya

Kenya’s president said he had fired the head of the Directorate of Criminal Investigations (DCI) over a rise in enforced disappearances and extrajudicial killings.

William Ruto made the reveal late Wednesday while speaking to leading media outlets in an omnibus interview. His statement came months after last September, when Ruto announced the resignation of DCI boss boss George Kinoti, and so it is unclear if the exit was voluntary or not.

“There was a container at the Nairobi area where people were being slaughtered in a police station. I mean how did we end up there? What kind of rogue institution was that? And that’s why I fired that Kinoti man because it’s not right. There will be responsibility,” Ruto said.

He added that locals and police had recovered the bodies of over 200 Kenyans from thickets and rivers across the East African country, all suspected of being victims of police killings.

“There will be no extrajudicial killings in Kenya under my administration,” the Kenyan leader added in his first media interview since becoming president last September.

There have been increased police killings and enforced disappearances by authorities in Kenya especially targeting Muslims suspected of being connected to terrorism.

Last October Ruto disbanded a special police squad accused of extrajudicial killings, enforced disappearances, torture, and extortion.

After popular Pakistani TV host Arshad Sharif was shot dead by police last October, Pakistani detectives sent to Kenya said that the journalist had been assassinated.

Over the years popular Muslim clerics have been allegedly killed or disappeared police in Kenya.

Ruto also defended his move to import genetically modified organism (GMO) foods, urging Kenyans to eat them.