Author: KahawaTungu Reporter

Tragedy struck a family when four members were Saturday morning killed in a fire incident in Kabete, Kiambu County.  The victims included three children and their mother. It happened in Kabocha village, area police boss Anthony Mbogoh said. The cause of the fire is yet to be known, he said. The remains of the victims were discovered long after the fire had been contained. The fire, which started at 2:00 am on Saturday, December 30, burnt the house to the ground, while the four were sleeping. Mbogo stated that the fire’s cause is still unknown. Police have launched investigations into…

A New Jersey man, inspired by Hamas’ October 7 attack on Israel was arrested in Kenya, after allegedly seeking to join al Shabaab terror group in Somalia, authorities said Friday. Karrem Nasr, a 23-year-old Garden State resident and U.S. citizen who also went under the name Ghareeb Al-Muhaji, was taken into custody in Nairobi on December 14 before being taken to the United States on Thursday, federal prosecutors said. He was extradited to New York to face charges of attempting to provide material support to al-Shabaab, the Somalia based terror group affiliated with al-Qaida. Nasr, “motivated by the heinous terrorist…

Google has agreed to settle a consumer privacy lawsuit seeking at least $5 billion (Sh785 billion) in damages over allegations it tracked the data of users who thought they were browsing the internet privately. The object of the lawsuit was the “incognito” mode on Google’s Chrome browser that the plaintiffs said gave users a false sense that what they were surfing online was not being tracked by the Silicon Valley tech firm. But internal Google emails brought forward in the lawsuit demonstrated that users using incognito mode were being followed by the search and advertising behemoth for measuring web traffic…

Russia unleashed its biggest air attack of the war on Ukraine on Friday, killing 31 civilians, wounding more than 160 others and hitting cities and infrastructure across the country, officials said. NATO member Poland said a Russian missile appeared to have flown into its airspace for some 40 km before returning to Ukraine under three minutes later. But the Russian charge d’affaires, summoned to the Polish Foreign Ministry, said Warsaw had provided no evidence of a missile entering its airspace. The Ukrainian foreign ministry said the assault showed there should be “no talk of a truce” with the Kremlin at…

Argentine President Javier Milei has sent letters to BRICS leaders to formalize his decision to reject an invitation to join the grouping of major emerging economies, the presidency said Friday. The bloc — made up of Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa — in August announced it was admitting six new members in a bid to counter the Western-led global order. The membership of Argentina, Ethiopia, Iran, Saudi Arabia, Egypt and the United Arab Emirates was due to take effect from January 1, 2024. The letters signed by Milei and published by several media houses said Argentina’s membership was…

Iran executed on Friday four people, including a woman, whom it accused of being “saboteurs” with links to Israel’s Mossad intelligence service, the Mizan news agency affiliated to the judiciary said. The executions took to five the number of people put to death this month in a decades-long shadow war that has seen Iran accuse Israel of attacks on its nuclear effort, charges the latter has never confirmed or denied. “Four members of a sabotage team associated with the Zionist regime … were executed this morning following legal procedures,” the news agency said, accusing them of “extensive” actions, guided by…

Three of the four men who were reportedly beaten by Del Monte farm guards in Murang’a died as a result of drowning.  The bodies were also found bearing visible injuries on their heads and necks, a postmortem conducted on Friday showed. The bodies of the three have been identified as Mbae Mulumbi, 21, Bernard Mutua, 22, and Francis Muimi 34 while one body still lies unidentified. A joint autopsy conducted by three pathologists at Thika’s General Kago morgue showed whose bodies were found at Thika River near Del Monte pineapple farm drowned. The exercise also indicated that two bodies had…

Interior Cabinet Secretary Kithure Kindiki Friday vowed stern action against individuals behind the murder of Meru County blogger Daniel Muthiani, popularly known as Sniper. Kindiki, in a post on his official X account, said detectives are concluding the process of identifying the “evil perpetrators”. “Those responsible for organizing, financing and executing the cruel murder of Daniel Muthiani, alias Sniper, have a date with justice,” said Kindiki. “Detectives are concluding the process of identifying the evil perpetrators, including those who lured the young man to his death and those who tortured, murdered and dumped his body in an attempt to conceal…

Transactions on all NTSA services will be restricted, the National Transport and Safety Authority (NTSA) has said. This is due to the closure of the Transport Integrated Management System (TIMS) portal. In a statement on Friday, the authority stated that the shutdown will take place from December 29 to January 1 in response to the notice sent on December 13 about the transfer of all NTSA services to the e-Citizen platform. “During this period, all NTSA online service access will be integrated with e-Citizen platform single sign on, in preparation for the Go Live on Tuesday January 2,” said NTSA.…

Gunmen suspected al-Shabaab militants raided the Quick Response Unit (QRU) Alungu camp in Lafey sub-county, Mandera County on Friday morning prompting a shootout.  The more than 20 attackers used high explosive bombs, rocket-propelled grenades and rifles (PKM and AK47). Police said the gang raided the camp from the northwest, launching an attack within 100 metres of the camp. Swift and vigilant officers responded promptly and engaged the attackers in a fierce 15-minute confrontation and successfully repelled them, police said. Police said there were no injuries to officers and everyone was accounted for. The incident follows a recent attack in Dasheq…

A Kenyan woman was arrested at Mumbai’s Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj International Airport for allegedly smuggling cocaine.  She was carrying 1.4 kilos of cocaine valued at about Sh8 million when she was intercepted, police said. In Kenya, a kilo of cocaine fetches between Sh4 million and Sh5 million while in international market it can go as far as Sh12 million, police say. It also depends on the market and demand. The Kenyan national, who travelled via a Kenya airways flight from Nairobi to Mumbai on December 28, Thursday, was apprehended by Directorate of Revenue Intelligence (DRI) officers. “The ingenious concealment of…

President William Ruto has scored a D or 47 percent approval rating, in terms of his performance in the year 2023. This is according to a survey by Infotrak Research Consulting. The survey released on Friday showed that Rift Valley gave the President 50 percent, Western 49 percent, Nairobi and Central 48 percent, Eastern 46 percent, Coast 44 percent, North Eastern 43 percent and Nyanza 41 percent. His deputy, Rigathi Gachagua, scored an E of 36 percent. Gachagua received the highest score of 40 percent from Rift Valley, Central 39 percent, Western and Eastern 37 percent, Coast 35 percent ,…

Kenya’s inflation rate dropped to 6.6% year in December from 6.8% in November, the Kenya National Bureau of Statistics (KNBS) has said. According to the report,  month-on-month inflation was 0.4% as opposed to 0.2% in November. The statistics office explained that the rise in inflation was due to rise in the prices of commodities in various sectors, including Transport (11.7%); Housing, Water, Electricity, Gas, and Other Fuels (8.3%); and Food and Non-alcoholic Beverages (7.7%) between December 2022 and December 2023. The Housing, Water, Electricity, Gas, and other Fuels’ Index saw a 0.4% increase between November 2023 and December 2023, driven…

South Korean star Lee Sun-kyun’s family bid him farewell in a private funeral, shutting out the cameras that had stalked him in his last months when he was under investigation for drug use. The entertainment industry has been put on hold, with several events canceled, as former colleagues turned up to remember Lee. On Friday, his family mourned him along with close friends and colleagues, after appealing to Korean media to stop making “painful and abrupt” visits to Lee’s home, agency, and funeral. His alleged last note to his wife, which a Korean media outlet was criticized for publicizing, CCTV…

Market researcher TIFA has released an assessment gauging the general perception of Kenyans towards 2023. The survey released on Friday showed that 60 percent of Kenyans in the Rift Valley region thought this year was worse compared to 2022. However, the survey showed that Kenyans from Nairobi and Nyanza areas were more discontent with the year that comes to a close in two days. 76 percent of Nyanza region thought 2023 was worse while 74% of Nairobi residents held the same opinion. Compared to 2022, 67% of Kenyans expressed displeasure with 2023. The survey also showed that the Eastern region,…