NAIROBI — Kenyan police said Tuesday they had arrested a suspected German militant and deported him shortly after issuing an alert about his presence in the country.
Police spokesman Eric Kiraithe said Sascha Alessandro Boettcher, who arrived in Kenya on September 22, was arrested in Mtwapa outside the coastal city of Mombasa.
"Kindly note that the suspect has been arrested from a private residence in Mtwapa and deported back to Germany," Kiraithe said.
In a statement earlier, the police spokesman said: "Based on the information we have received from the German embassy, the Kenya police would like to alert the public that there is a wanted terror suspect in the country."
Police said they were informed by the embassy that the suspect, a Muslim convert, had left a note for his mother that he would not return home alive.
Boettcher, 23, arrived in Kenya through Moi International Airport in Mombasa having left Frankfurt aboard Condor Air, reportedly heading for Somalia, Kiraithe said.
Police released pictures of Boettcher, one showing him clean shaven and wearing a grey hooded top and dark trousers, and another of him wearing a Muslim prayer cap and sporting bushy beard.
Several foreign jihadists have transited through Kenya to Somalia where an Al-Qaeda-inspired insurgency is battling to overthrow the Western-backed transitional government.
The hardline Islamist group, Shebab, controls much of Somalia and has previously acknowledged receiving foreign fighters to swell its ranks.
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