Al-Shabab Attack on a Kenya University Kills 147, Officials Say

Gunmen attacked a university campus in eastern Kenya early Thursday, clashing with guards, forcing their way into dormitories, taking hostages and singling out non-Muslims, the authorities said.

Kenya's interior minister, Joseph Nkaissery, said that 147 people had been killed, including four attackers. He contended that the deadly siege of the university had ended, with security forces now carefully sweeping the campus for any remaining threats.

Kenyan security forces surrounded the campus of Garissa University College and clashed with the gunmen throughout the day, eventually cornering them in one dormitory, officials said. Abdikadir Sugow, the spokesman for the Garissa county government, said the gunmen were seen wearing "combat gear," including what appeared to be "either bulletproof vests or suicide bomb vests."

Al-Shabab, an extremist group based in Somalia and affiliated with al-Qaida, issued a statement through a radio station it controls claiming responsibility for the attack.

It said its fighters attacked the university early Thursday morning, began separating Muslims from non-Muslims and started an "operation against the infidels." The group said in its statement earlier in the day that its fighters were still inside the university.

In 2013, al-Shabab mounted an attack on a Nairobi shopping mall that turned into a four-day siege and left 67 people dead.

The Kenyan authorities offered a bounty of 20 million Kenyan shillings (about $215,000) for information leading to the capture of Mohammed Mohamud, who they said was the "most wanted" suspect in connection with the university attack. They said Mohamud was also known by the names Dulyadin and Gamadhere.

President Uhuru Kenyatta issued a statement extending condolences to the families of victims and saying that he and his government "continue to pray for the quick recovery of the injured, and the safe rescue of those held hostage."

The disaster operations center said that four critically wounded people had been airlifted to Nairobi, the capital, for treatment.

Sugow, the county spokesman, said the college "hosts students from all over Kenya, of different religious and ethnic backgrounds."

Augustine Alanga, 21, an economics student at the college, said he had been asleep in his dormitory when the shooting began. Startled and afraid, he said, he bolted from his room without stopping to put on his shoes, and got cuts on his feet as he sprinted barefoot across the campus and into a nearby forest.