A Somali rebel group which is fighting the transitional government of the Horn of Africa nation have threatened fresh attacks on Kenya, seeking annexing part of the east African nation's northern region and subject it to Islamic law.

North Eastern Provincial Commissioner Kimeu Maingi said Al-Shabaab militiamen have issued fresh threats to the Kenyan government, threatening to invade the northeastern region with the intention of annexing and subjecting it to Islamic Law.

According to Kenya News Agency, Maingi said on Sunday that the militia groups have officially communicated to the government, saying they were determined to invade the North Eastern province and make it part of their country and rule it with their religious laws.

Maingi said the abduction of several Kenyan citizens witnessed at the border town of Mandera was part of a wider scheme to force a reaction from the Kenyan government.

The administrator expressed concerns at the increasing cases of locals acquiring small arms from the strife-torn country which, he said, could be used in such an attack.

Maingi, however, said the government had put up measures to counter such an attack from the militia including deploying extra troops to man the expansive and porous Kenyan-Somali border and the disarmament of residents in the province.

Speaking at Warable in Fafi district during a relief food distribution exercise, Maingi said it was unjustifiable for local people to keep demanding food rations from the government when they routinely exchanged their livestock for firearms with Somali militia at the porous border.

Early this year, two people were killed when members of these two clans clashed over the ownership of a water pan and pastureland.

Maingi issued an indefinite ultimatum for the local to surrender the firearms they had illegally acquired from Somalia, saying the government was committed to safeguarding its citizens by all means possible and no one would be allowed to own firearms illegally in the guise of protecting themselves.

(Xinhua News Agency April 27, 2009)