A child has been killed and six other people badly injured according to the Red Cross, in a grenade attack on a Sunday school at St Polycarp’s Anglican church on Juja Road, Nairobi.

A number of those hurt at the church were reportedly injured in a stampede that followed the attack.

“One child has died and three others have been seriously injured,” Nairobi police chief Moses Nyakwama said, “We suspect it was a grenade.”

A church official said nine children had been wounded (Capital FM report)

A police spokesman, Charles Owino, told Reuters news agency: “We suspect this blast might have been carried out by sympathisers of al-Shabaab”.

“These are the kicks of a dying horse since, of late, Kenyan police have arrested several suspects in connection with grenades.”

Grenade attack Nairobi: “PEOPLE STARTED RUNNING FOR THEIR LIVES…”

The BBC reports Irene Wambui, who was in the church at the time of the attack, saying: “We were just worshipping God in church when suddenly we heard an explosion and people started running for their lives.

“We came to realise that the explosion had injured some kids who were taken to hospital and unfortunately one succumbed.”

Nairobi police chief Moses Ombati has appealed for calm after youths reportedly attacked the nearby Alamin mosque.

Capital FM report: ‘One dead, scores hurt in Nairobi church grenade attack’

Standard: ‘One Child Dies, Several Injured in Church Explosion’

Update, 4:28 pm 

AFP reports: ‘SOMALIS ATTACKED IN NAIROBI AFTER DEADLY CHURCH BLAST’

Kenyan police on Sunday dispersed dozens of people throwing rocks at Somalis in Nairobi after a blast at a church killed one child and wounded nine. Around 100 people targeted people of Somali appearance and their homes in the Pangani quarter of the Kenyan capital, where a suspected grenade attack killed the child and wounded nine others.

JOURNALISTS ARRESTED

Three journalists of Somali origin working for the Horn Cable TV were also arrested as they filmed the scene. The journalists whose names were not immediately released were bundled into a police vehicle that sped off under tight security.

Other journalists at the scene witnessed as police confiscated their TV camera, notebooks and microphone. They held a microphone with the label HCTV–Horn Cable TV. The journalists showed police officers international press cards to allow them continue with their work but their pleas were not heard.

“They are going to be interrogated to establish if they are indeed journalists or they are here on another motive,” the Head of police operations in Nairobi,” Wilfred Mbithi said. Police have in the past said terrorists were staying behind terror attack scenes and posing as journalists to gather intelligence.