No bodies found in suspected mass grave in Kenya: police

Kenyan police have found no bodies during the excavation of a suspected mass grave in the troubled Tana River region, where recent ethnic clashes have left over 100 dead, officials said on Thursday.

“No bodies have been found there,” regional police chief Aggrey Adoli said, after a team of pathologists and grave diggers dug up the remote site that was discovered on Monday, adding that only part of one rotten human limb was found.

There was no clear explanation for why police had thought the site contained several bodies believed to have been killed in the recent violence, with Adoli admitting the situation was “strange”.

He suggested the site may have been “tampered with” and that bodies believed to have been buried were removed following the grave’s discovery.

“The appearance of the area and the heavy stench of rotting flesh pointed towards the existence of a grave,” he said.

Violence between the groups erupted in mid-August, pitting the Pokomo farming community against their Orma pastoralist neighbours, leading to a series of vicious reprisal killings and attacks.