Issue link: https://www.epageflip.net/i/490267
ByTomOdula,Rodney Muhumuza and Khalil Senosi The Associated Press GARISSA, KENYA Al-Sha- bab gunmen rampaged through a university in northeastern Kenya at dawn Thursday, killing 147 people in the group's dead- liest attack in the East Afri- can country. Four militants were slain by security forces to end the siege just after dusk. The masked attackers — strapped with explosives and armed with AK-47s — singled out non-Muslim stu- dents at Garissa University College and then gunned them down without mercy, survivors said. Others ran for their lives with bullets whistling through the air. The men took dozens of hostages in a dormitory for several hours as they battled troops and police before the operation was ended after about 13 hours, witnesses said. When gunfire from the Kenyan security forces struck the attackers, the militants exploded "like bombs," Interior Minis- ter Joseph Nkaissery said, adding that the shrapnel wounded some of the offi- cers. Al-Shabab spokesman Ali Mohamud Rage said fighters from the Soma- lia-based extremist group were responsible. The al- Qaida-linked group has been blamed for a series of attacks in Kenya, including the siege at the Westgate Mall in Nairobi in 2013 that killed 67 people, as well as other violence in the north. Most of the 147 dead were students, but the two se- curity guards, one police- man and one soldier also were killed in the attack, Nkaissery said. At least 79 people were wounded at the campus 145 kilometers (90 miles) from the Somali border, he said. A dusk-to-dawn cur- few was ordered in Garissa and three nearby counties. One suspected extremist was arrested as he tried to flee, Nkaissery told a news conference in Nairobi. Police identified a possi- ble mastermind of the at- tack as Mohammed Mo- hamud, who is alleged to lead al-Shabab's cross-bor- der raids into Kenya, and they posted a $220,000 bounty for him. Also known by the names Dulyadin and Gamadhere, he was a teacher at an Islamic reli- gious school, or madrassa, and claimed responsibility for a bus attack in Makka, Kenya, in November that killed 28 people. One of the survivors of Thursday's attack, Collins Wetangula, told The As- sociated Press he was pre- paring to take a shower when he heard gunshots coming from Tana dorm, which hosts both men and women, 150 meters (yards) away. The campus has six dorms and at least 887 stu- dents, he said. When he heard the gun- shots, he locked himself and three roommates in their room, said Wetangula, who is vice chairman of the uni- versity's student union. "All I could hear were footsteps and gunshots. No- body was screaming because they thought this would lead the gunmen to know where they are," he said. He added: "The gunmen were saying, 'Sisi ni al-Sha- bab,'" — Swahili for "We are al-Shabab." He heard the attackers arrive at his dormitory, open the doors and ask if the people who had hid- den inside were Muslims or Christians. "If you were a Christian, you were shot on the spot," he said. "With each blast of the gun, I thought I was go- ing to die." The gunmen then started shooting rapidly, as if ex- changing fire, Wetangula said. "The next thing, we saw people in military uniform through the window of the back of our rooms who identified themselves as the Kenyan military," he said. The soldiers took him and around 20 others to safety. The attack began about 5:30 a.m., as morning prayers were underway at the university mosque, where worshippers were not attacked, said Augus- tine Alanga, a 21-year-old student. At least five heavily armed, masked gunmen opened fire outside his dor- mitory, turning intense al- most immediately and set- ting off panic, he told the AP by telephone. The shooting kept some students indoors but scores of others fled through barbed-wire fencing around the campus, with the gun- men firing at them, he said. "I am just now recover- ing from the pain as I in- jured myself while trying to escape, Alanga said. I was running barefoot," Alanga said. TERRORIST ATTACK Al -S ha ba b mi li ta nt s ki ll 1 47 a t un iv er si ty i n Ke ny a KHALILSENOSI—THEASSOCIATEDPRESS A member of Kenya Defence Forces secures the area of the Garissa University college, in Garissa, Kenya, on Thursday. By Cathy Bussewitz The Associated Press HONOLULU A supervisor at the Veterans Administra- tion office in Honolulu was manipulating data to make it look like the agency was processing veterans' bene- fits claims faster than they actually were, according to a new report by the VA Of- fice of Inspector General. The data manipulation happened last year when there was heightened scru- tiny nationwide over how long veterans were waiting to see doctors. The electronic records altered in Honolulu dealt with benefits claims, not medical appointments. But the finding underscores that there are ongoing prob- lems within the system. The Honolulu supervi- sor was removing controls in the electronic record that are used to track and iden- tify the progress of claims. "It made his performance measures for his team look better than they actually were," said Brent Arronte, director of the San Diego Benefits Inspection Divi- sion of the VA Office of In- spector General. Those data manipula- tions resulted in delays for the delivery of benefits to veterans, including bene- fits like payments for de- pendents, Arronte said. There has been no indi- cation that the manipula- tion was particularly wide- spread, but it wasn't unique. "We haven't seen this at all 57 regional offices, we have seen it at a few. I think four additional ones aside from Honolulu," he said. The Hawaii investigation was originally prompted by the Honolulu VA Regional Office, which asked the in- spectors to review 147 cases from April through August 2014 in which they believed the supervisor had removed the controls used to track claims. The inspectors re- viewed 139 of those — be- cause the others were lo- cated at a different facil- ity — and found that the supervisor inappropriately manipulated the records in 100 of the cases, a rate of about 72 percent. The Office of Inspector General then reviewed an- other 48 cases which they selected at random, and found that the supervisor had removed the controls in 43 claims — nearly 90 per- cent of those records. Each claim corresponds to an individual person, so there were 143 veter- ans known to be affected, although the extent of the impact wasn't yet known, Arronte said. Since 90 per- cent of the randomly se- lected records were manip- ulated, the actual number of affected veterans could be much higher. The inspectors recom- mended that the Honolulu regional office review the problematic cases, and the regional office agreed, the report said. "If anybody was harmed they're going to fix it," Ar- ronte said. The supervisor in ques- tion has since resigned, the report said. A representa- tive from the VA Regional Office in Honolulu wasn't immediately available for comment. VA Report: Hawaii office supervisor manipulated veterans benefit data By Daniel Estrin The Associated Press JERUSALEM Israeli secu- rity forces scoured parts of the West Bank searching for a missing Israeli man amid fears he may have been ab- ducted on Thursday. Police said they received a call earlier in the after- noon about a car stop- ping to fix a flat tire and a 22-year-old Israeli man go- ing into a nearby Palestin- ian village to seek help. The caller said he stayed back in the car when his friend left to find help. The friend had left his phone in the car, ac- cording to the caller. A senior defense official, who spoke on condition of anonymity as he was not authorized to talk to report- ers, said authorities were treating the incident as an abduction. Last year, Palestinians abducted and killed three Israeli teenagers sparking a chain of events that led to the 50 day summer war in Gaza. Relatives of the missing man told Israeli media that he was on his way to pray at a holy site in the West Bank city of Hebron. Hours after he went missing, media said the ini- tial claim of a flat tire as the cause for the car stopping was false. By nightfall there was still no sign of the missing man. Earlier in the day, Isra- el's Supreme Court rejected a government proposal to route the West Bank separa- tion barrier through church properties in a scenic val- ley outside of Jerusalem, a long-running case that has drawn the interest of Pope Francis. Israel began building the barrier more than a decade ago, saying it prevents Pal- estinian attacks inside Is- rael. Palestinians charge that the barrier is mainly a land grab because much of it runs through the West Bank, often zig-zagging to include Jewish settlements and additional lands on the "Israeli side" of the barrier. Israel's Defense Minis- try had proposed to route the barrier through the Cremisan Valley, leaving a Roman Catholic monas- tery on the Jerusalem side of the barrier and its sister convent on the West Bank side, and separating Pal- estinian landowners from their lands. Israeli author- ities had promised access between the monastery and convent, and for the Palestinians to their lands, through gates manned by soldiers. The monastery, convent and Palestinian landown- ers in the area petitioned the court to change the planned route so the bar- rier would run closer to Je- rusalem and keep the val- ley intact. Palestinian land- owners presented their case to Pope Francis on his visit to the Holy Land last year. They said he promised to look into it. The court on Thursday ordered the Defense Min- istry to offer an alternative route that poses less of a burden on the local Pales- tinian residents, as well as the monastery and convent. Also Thursday, a Pales- tinian stabbed an Israeli soldier during an arrest of Palestinians who had sneaked past the separation barrier on their way into Is- rael, the military said. The soldier was stabbed in the West Bank alongside the barrier. He suffered light injuries and was evacuated to the hospital, the military said. In a separate incident, Is- rael arrested a female Pal- estinian lawmaker from a left-wing militant group for disobeying an Israeli order barring her from the city of Ramallah. The military said it ar- rested Khalida Jarrar, a se- nior political leader of the Popular Front for the Lib- eration of Palestine, early Thursday due to "substantial concerns about the safety and security of the region." Last year, the military confined her movement to the city of Jericho and its surroundings. The army said the restraining order was based on her "incite- ment and involvement in terror." It gave no further details. Her husband, Ghassan Jarrar, said she was ar- rested from their Ramal- lah home. She had long flaunted the Israeli ban. The military said it has not decided whether to press charges. MIDDLE EAST Israeli missing in West Bank, troops searching for man MAHMOUD ILLEAN — THE ASSOCIATED PRESS Israeli soldiers search a van in the village of Beit Anun, West Bank, on Thursday. Thiscouldbeyourluckyday by helping a dog or cat find a loving home from... Ad Sponsorship $ 25 Call Suzy 737-5056 RedBluffDailyNews ELI Paws & Claws TEHAMACOUNTYANIMAL SHELTER 1830 Walnut Street P.O. Box 38 • Red Bluff, CA 96080 (530) 527-3439 CORNING ANIMAL SHELTER 4312 Rawson Rd. Corning, CA 96021 (530) 824-7054 ADOPT A PET TODAY | NEWS | REDBLUFFDAILYNEWS.COM FRIDAY, APRIL 3, 2015 6 B