DHAKA: Al-Shabab gunmen have attacked a college campus in the town of Garissa in northeast Kenya, shooting indiscriminately in dormitories and killing at least 15 people and wounding 65 others, police said.

Witnesses said explosions and heavy gunfire rocked Garissa University College early on Thursday as the gunmen stormed the complex. Ambulances were seen driving injured students to local hospitals.

The gunmen were holding an "unknown number of student hostages," the Kenya Red Cross said in a statement. About "50 students have been safely freed", the organisation said.

Terrified students streamed out of buildings, some young men shirtless, as arriving police officers hunkered down, taking cover, witnesses said.

Kenyan security forces have cordoned off the area, and have entered the compound laying siege to the block where the gunmen are holding their captives. Witnesses reported hearing sporadic exchanges of fire between police and the fighters.

A worried mother of a student holed up in one of the dormitories told Al Jazeera that her son described the situation inside the facility as war zone with gunfire and explosions ranting the air.

“I am worried that my son will get hurt, he told me was hiding and sounded terrified,” she said.

'Christians held hostage'

Somalia's al-Qaeda-linked al-Shabab group said their gunmen were holding Christian hostages inside the complex in revenge for Nairobi's troops fighting in Somalia.

The gunmen divided students at the university between Muslims and non-Muslims, letting the Muslim students go, the group's spokesman Sheikh Ali Mohamud Rage said.

Source: news.yahoo.com

BDST: 2001 HRS, APR 02, 2015

** Gunmen attack Garissa University in Kenya