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Cuban Speaker visits Nairobi to seek clarity on kidnapped doctors' fate

Cuban National Assembly President Esteban Lazo Hernandez. (Photo: File)

By Mary Wambui | Wednesday, February 21, 2024

The doctors were kidnapped on April 12, 2019, by suspected Al-Shabaab militants and unconfirmed reports indicate they were killed in a US drone strike last week.

The Cuban National Assembly president is leading a delegation to Nairobi, Kenya, to clarify the fate of two doctors who were abducted in Kenya almost five years ago.

The doctors were kidnapped on April 12, 2019, by suspected Al-Shabaab militants and unconfirmed reports indicate they were killed in a US drone strike last week.

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In a press statement, the Cuban Foreign Ministry said Esteban Lazo Hernandez will "carry out urgent negotiations with the highest authorities of Kenya in the search for cooperation and clarification, in light of the recent news published about the possible unconfirmed death of doctors Assel Herrera Correa and Landy Rodriguez Hernandez."

The doctors were part of a 100-member team of Cuban doctors working in Kenya under a bilateral agreement signed in 2018. They were stationed at the Mandera County Referral Hospital.

During their abduction, Constable Mutundo Kitambo, one of the two police officers deployed as their escort, was killed.

Two years later, their driver, Issack Ibrein Robow, a government employee who was attached to Mandera County, was found guilty of facilitating the incident and thereby committing a terrorist act. He was charged with the commission of a terrorist act, kidnapping and hostage, obtaining registration by false pretence and being unlawfully in Kenya respectively.

Attempts by security agencies to rescue the doctors failed and their whereabouts remained unknown until last week, when the militant group alarmingly claimed they were killed in "multiple drone strikes" in the southern Somalia city of Jilib on February 15.

The Eastleigh Voice could not independently verify the claims.

US response

Cuba said that on receiving the claims of the doctors' deaths, it gave priority to efforts by international actors to help obtain facts about the matter to have the most objective information.

The Foreign ministry added that it approached the United States government through diplomatic channels in search of clarification.

"To date, there has been no public statement from the United States government or its armed forces that confirms the news regarding the kidnapped Cuban collaborators or denies what has been reported," the ministry said in a statement.

"There is no knowledge about the circumstances and characteristics of the military cooperation and the AFRICIOM spokesperson confirms to have occurred, whether justified, and whether it acted with the obligatory care to avoid collateral, damage, protect civilians and innocents, and due respect to international humanitarian law."

AFRICIOM - the US Africa Command - confirmed that an air strike was conducted against the Al-Shabaab network near Jilib on that date.

"We are aware of reports of a strike alleged to have killed two civilians. We do not have any further information at this time about these reports, but we do take all claims of civilian casualties seriously," it said in a statement to AFP on Monday.