NAIROBI, Kenya, June 4 (UPI) -- U.S. officials announced Wednesday they would close the new U.S. Embassy in Nairobi Thursday because of the security situation in the country.
The move is a "precaution based on the heightened security situation in Nairobi and Kenya over the past weeks," the Embassy said.
Between 10 and 20 security officers from Washington are in Kenya to review internal security measures at the embassy, which also had an unscheduled closure last Tuesday.
There has been no official explanation of the "heightened security situation."
Last week, Kenya's Internal Affairs Minister Chris Marungaru announced that al-Qaida suspect Fazul Abdullah Mohammed, who is wanted in the country in connection with terror attacks on U.S. embassies in Kenya and Tanzania in 1998, has returned.
British Airways recently suspended flights to Kenya because of possible terrorist threats. An Israel charter flight was shot at with a surface-to-air missile last Thanksgiving as it took off from Moi International Airport, Kenya's main tourist airport on the coast. The missile narrowly missed a wing, according to witnesses in the plane, but the perpetrators have not been caught.
"Most officials at the Nairobi airport don't seem to understand the seriousness of the terrorist threat," said a U.S. official who declined to be named and who has been working closely with Kenyan airport officials on security issues.
The United States recently donated security equipment and specially trained dogs to airport officials to check luggage for bombs and drugs.
