Al-Shabaab militants on Sunday night reportedly took over Ishakani Police Station in Lamu and pitched camp there for hours, taking down the Kenyan flag and hoisting an Islamist one.
The militants eventually withdrew from the station, which police officers had fled two weeks ago in fear of an imminent attack.
The local primary school also had to be shut down after teachers started fleeing south towards Kiunga.
Reports indicate that 30 to 40 heavily armed militants wearing balaclavas and jungle uniforms crossed into Ishakani Village from Southern Somalia.
Area residents revealed that the militants stayed in Ishakani until 8 am.
[caption caption="Police in Lamu after a past Al-Shabaab attack"]
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Mohammed Abdalla, a local elder, divulged that the militants stormed the local mosque and pulled out four elders for talks before informing worshippers that they were not there to harm them.
The militants then shepherded area residents into the mosque and preached their extremist ideology to them.
Ishakani is located in a remote part of Lamu County where Kenya's border with Somalia meets the Indian Ocean and is prone to insurgent infiltration.
This is despite there being a heavy presence of Kenyan security forces in the area and a few kilometres into the Somalia side.
There are growing fears that Al-Shabaab could be using small raids in Lamu as a diversion from a large-scale attack.
[caption caption="Inspector-General of Police Joseph Boinnet inspecting the progress of an operation meant to flush out Al-Shabaab militants in Lamu"]
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