AN ABERDEENSHIRE grandmother has been reliving the aftermath of the terrorist attack on a shopping mall in Kenya that left almost 70 people dead.
The atrocity, which lasted four days, began on September 21 in the capital, Nairobi.
Susanna Bastable and her husband Guy, originally from Methlick, moved to the African country three-and-a-half years ago to work for the New Life Home Trust – an organisation that helps find homes for babies who are abandoned in Kenya.
The couple live just five miles from the Westgate shopping mall, where gunmen laid siege. Somali militant group al Shabab has claimed responsibility.
Mrs Bastable, 53, said: “Some people had been shot but at first we thought that it had been a robbery.
“Throughout the day, we realised that it was a terrorist attack and it is horrible that the shopping mall was a target.
“It is the kind of place where affluent Kenyans or expatriates would go.”
The couple later heard that three children who go to school with their adopted sons had been shot and two parents of pupils had died in the attacks.
Mrs Bastable added: “A few days after the attack, we had a visit from a woman who had lost her daughter and her unborn granddaughter because they had been shot at the shopping mall.”
The siege finally came to an end on Tuesday, September 24, and Kenya’s president announced in a televised address that five militants had been killed and 11 were in custody. Thirty-nine people remain unaccounted for.
Full story, Pages 12 and 13