Kenya has received KSh40 billion from the United States to fight terrorism in the last 10 years, a new report shows.
In the period under review, the US Department of Defense gave Kenya about $400 million (over Sh40.4 billion) in counterterrorism aid to help fight terrorist groups such as Al-Shabaab, according to the US Congressional Research Service, a public policy research institute of the US Congress.
This places Kenya’s security agencies among Africa’s top beneficiaries of support by Washington. But the think tank notes that aid from the US has been marred by allegations of human rights abuses perpetrated by the security agencies.
“Allegations of abuses by Kenyan security forces have posed challenges for security co-operation,” said Lauren Ploch Blanchard, a specialist in African Affairs with the US Congressional Research Service, in a new research note published on January 16th.
“Kenya is nevertheless routinely the top sub-Saharan recipient of US anti-terrorism assistance for law enforcement.”
Blanchard noted that the funds given to Kenya were mainly spent on training and equipping the military. Kenya does not make public its national security expenditure and foreign aid and only Parliament is mandated to scrutinize expenditure by key security organs.
The public disclosures by the US Congressional Research Service provide a sneak view into the breadth of co-operation between Kenya and the US in combating terrorism. In 2017, the US Embassy in Nairobi announced the US had donated over KSh11.5 billion in military equipment and assistance to the Kenyan military in that year alone.
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