By Joseph Akwiri
MOMBASA (Reuters) - Three Kenyan soldiers were wounded on Sunday when their truck hit a make-shift bomb that police said had been planted by insurgents from Somali Islamist group al Shabaab.
The blast took place in the same region - Lamu County on Kenya's northern coast - where last Sunday al Shabaab fighters killed two soldiers during an attack on a Kenyan military base. Kenyan troops repelled the attack, killing 11 militants.
Joseph Boinnet, Kenya's police chief, said on Twitter (NYSE:TWTR) the three soldiers were wounded when the Kenyan Defence Forces truck "hit an IED".
A police official in Boinnet's office said the improvised explosive device was "planted by al Shabaab militia".
"It appears the group which attacked Baure Military camp are still in area an may be regrouping for more attacks against security establishments," said the official, adding that KDF is carrying out operations in the area to "flush them out".
Al Shabaab fighters have staged several cross border raids in Lamu County since last June, including two attacks in the town of Mpeketoni, in which militants killed at least 60 people a year ago.
Although Mpeketoni is inland from Kenya's Indian Ocean coastline, the attacks froze the tourism industry in Lamu, which had been popular with tourists from Europe and North America.
Al Shabaab, which seeks to overthrow the Western-backed Somali government and impose its strict interpretation of Islamic law, has frequently targeted neighbouring Kenya in recent years, saying it is retaliating for Kenya's participation in an African Union peacekeeping force in Somalia.