NAIROBI (SD) – Five al-Shabaab suspects have been nabbed following a security operation in Mandera town near Kenya-Somalia border.

The suspected were arrested and IED making substance recovered after joint forces inspected number of suburbs in the town following public tips off.

In a Statement, the police said the five who are in the hands of the police undergoing interrogation.

“The men are suspected to have been planning to carry out terror attacks in Mandera town. We have recovered explosives in two houses rented by these suspects,” the statement reads in part.

The development comes amid al-Shabaab militants intensified their attacks in Mandera county.

Since the beginning of the year, al-Shabaab fighters conducted over ten attacks in the county in which severed people were killed and three Safaricom masts.

Al-Shabaab militant group has been carrying out attacks in Kenya since 2011 when East Africa nation sent its troops to Somalia.

Currently Kenya has over 3000 soldiers working under the framework of African Union Mission in Somalia (AMISOM).

The government of Kenya is lobbying for extension term of AU troops in Somalia saying the horn of Africa nation is yet unable to take control of the responsibility of its security owing the weaknesses of Somali forces.