At Least 30 Killed in Bus Crash in Kenya

At least 30 people were killed in a bus crash in Kenya. (AP file photo)
At least 30 people were killed in a bus crash in Kenya. (AP file photo)
TT

At Least 30 Killed in Bus Crash in Kenya

At least 30 people were killed in a bus crash in Kenya. (AP file photo)
At least 30 people were killed in a bus crash in Kenya. (AP file photo)

At least 30 people were killed in Kenya on Sunday when a bus crashed into a truck.

A police official said at least 36 people were killed in the headlong collision that took place close to Nakuru town. Sixteen people were injured.

The accident occurred close to a notorious stretch on the Nakuru-Eldoret highway when a bus traveling from Busia, in western Kenya, collided with a truck coming from Nakuru. Police said the death toll for that stretch of road has now reached 100 this month alone.

Rift Valley traffic police chief Zero Arome said the bus's brakes are suspected to have failed.

He added that the drivers of both vehicles were among the dead, as well as a three-year-old child, while the injured had been taken to a Nakuru hospital.

One survivor, speaking from his hospital bed, said he had been asleep at the back of the bus when the collision happened.

"All I heard was a loud bang and screams from all over," he said. "I was seated at the back and was helped out after some time because my legs were stuck. It is by the grace of God that I am alive. I saw many people dead and their bodies mutilated."

The National Transport and Safety Authority has been criticized for failing to reduce road accidents, which account for around 3,000 Kenyan deaths every year.

While authorities have blamed careless road users, unroadworthy vehicles and speeding for the accidents, other observers say poor road construction and maintenance are to blame.



At Least 80 People Killed in Northeast Colombia as Peace Talks Fail, Official Says

Displaced people from recent clashes between armed groups arrive in the municipality of Tibú, Norte de Santander Department, Colombia, on January 18, 2025. (AFP)
Displaced people from recent clashes between armed groups arrive in the municipality of Tibú, Norte de Santander Department, Colombia, on January 18, 2025. (AFP)
TT

At Least 80 People Killed in Northeast Colombia as Peace Talks Fail, Official Says

Displaced people from recent clashes between armed groups arrive in the municipality of Tibú, Norte de Santander Department, Colombia, on January 18, 2025. (AFP)
Displaced people from recent clashes between armed groups arrive in the municipality of Tibú, Norte de Santander Department, Colombia, on January 18, 2025. (AFP)

More than 80 people have been killed in the country’s northeast region following failed attempts to hold peace talks with the National Liberation Army, a Colombian official said.

Twenty others have been injured, according to William Villamizar, governor of North Santander, where many of the killings occurred.

Among the victims are community leader Carmelo Guerrero and seven people who sought to sign a peace deal, according to a report that a government ombudsman agency released late Saturday.

Officials said the attacks occurred in several towns located in the Catatumbo region near the border with Venezuela, with at least three people who were part of the peace talks being kidnapped.

Thousands of people are fleeing the area, with some hiding in the nearby lush mountains or seeking help at government shelters.

“Catatumbo needs help,” Villamizar said in a public address on Saturday. “Boys, girls, young people, teenagers, entire families are showing up with nothing, riding trucks, dump trucks, motorcycles, whatever they can, on foot, to avoid being victims of this confrontation."

The attack comes after Colombia suspended peace talks with the National Liberation Army, or ELN, on Friday, the second time it has done so in less than a year.

Colombia’s government has demanded that the ELN cease all attacks and allow authorities to enter the region and provide humanitarian aid.

The ELN has been clashing in Catatumbo with former members of the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, or FARC, a guerrilla group that disbanded after signing a peace deal in 2016 with Colombia's government. The two are fighting over control of a strategic border region that has coca leaf plantations.

The ELN said in a statement Saturday that it had warned former FARC members that if they “continued attacking the population...there was no other way out than armed confrontation.” The ELN has accused ex-FARC rebels of several killings in the area, including the Jan. 15 slaying of a couple and their 9-month-old baby.

Colombia's army said Sunday that it rescued a local community leader and a relative that the ELN was persecuting, but dozens more awaited rescue.

Defense Minister Iván Velásquez was scheduled to travel to the northeast town of Cúcuta while officials prepared to send 10 tons of food and hygiene kits for approximately 5,000 people in the communities of Ocaña and Tibú, the majority of them having fled the violence.

The ELN has tried to negotiate a peace deal with the administration of President Gustavo Petro five times, with talks failing after bouts of violence. ELN demands include that it be recognized as a political rebel organization, which critics have said is risky.