MOMBASA, Kenya, Aug. 31 (UPI) -- Kenyan police said four patrolmen were injured in a grenade attack in Mombasa, the site of rioting in the wake of the slaying of a controversial cleric.
Regional police chief Aggrey Adoli confirmed to the BBC that four policemen were injured when their vehicle was hit by a grenade near a Christian church in Mombasa.
The attack followed rioting in the city that left four people dead. Demonstrations in Mombasa broke out Tuesday after an Islamic cleric tied to al-Qaida was killed in a drive-by shooting. The cleric, Aboud Rogo Mohammed, was described by the U.N. Security Council as the ideological leader of a Kenyan group allied with al-Shabaab in neighboring Somalia.
The BBC said demonstrators accused Kenyan authorities of targeting the cleric, though police spokesman Charles Ownio said al-Shabaab carried out the attack "to galvanize support among the youth."
Security was tight in Mombasa as President Mwai Kibaki arrived to attend an annual agriculture exhibition.
Elections are scheduled in Kenya next year. More than 1,000 people were killed in fighting between supporters of Kibaki and those of rival Raila Odinga, now prime minister, in 2007.
