Kenya police launch probe after 21 unidentified bodies dumped in river

 

  Kenyan police said on Wednesday they have launched an investigation after badly decomposed bodies, some of which bore signs of torture, were found in a river.
A Kenyan rights group said it counted 21 unidentified bodies – all men – in a hospital morgue that workers there said had been retrieved from the River Yala in a scenic area of western Kenya.
“Some of the bodies were tied with ropes, others had deep cuts and others had polythene bags on the heads,” Haki Africa executive director Hussein Khalid said in a statement after the visit on Monday.
“The mortuary attendant informed us that at least 10 bodies were found in individual sacks which were properly stitched like parcels.”Khalid also said on the same day Haki Africa’s team visited the Yala morgue, they spotted two bodies floating in the river, trapped in the rapids.
Morgue officials told the activists they keep unclaimed corpses for 90 days before burying them – suggesting the bodies may have been found over the past three months.
But police said Wednesday that only 19 cases of bodies being found dumped in the Yala had been reported over the past two years.
“This number represents a cumulative body count over the stated period contrary to media reports insinuating all the incidences are a recent occurrence,” police spokesman Bruno Shioso said in a statement.
Shioso said a team of investigators has been assigned to the case but that despite repeated appeals, no-one has claimed the bodies.