Following the abduction of Cuban doctors Herrera Correa and Landhi Rodrigue on Friday by suspected Islamist militants, highly regarded Somali leaders are set to travel to Somalia to negotiate their release.
Reports by the Star indicate that at least 10 of them left for Somalia on Friday to start the talks.
The Cuban doctors, who were working in Mandera, Kenya, as part of an exchange programme, were abducted in an ambush that left a police bodyguard dead.
It is believed that the Cuban doctors who were abducted were taken to Somalia.
Police spokesman Charles Owino on Friday confirmed that the vehicle and the doctor’s driver have since been recovered.
The driver, however, is still being held by police in a bid to help them with the investigations on the matter.
In earlier interviews, Dr. Rodriguez, a specialist in surgery, had expressed his fears over working in Mandera after reading about frequent Al Shabaab attacks before he travelled to Kenya.
Mandera governor Ali Roba, on Friday, condemned the attack and urged the Somali elders to initiate talks with their counterparts in Somalia in an effort to ensure the two doctors come back home safe.
“We appeal to the security agencies to do whatever it takes to save the lives of our Cuban doctors and bring them back from captivity. I send my condolences to the family of the departed officer,” Roba reiterated in an interview to newsrooms.
This abduction comes after, an Italian volunteer, Silva Romano, was kidnapped in Kenya’s coastal region by gunmen linked to Al-Shabaab in November last year.
She has not been found.
