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More than 100 people have been found dead in mass graves in eastern Kenya. The dead are believed to have belonged to a sect where they were told to starve themselves. Two leaders of the sect are on trial on Tuesday.
The two suspected leaders are in custody and will appear before courts in two different cities.
The movement’s leader Paul Mackenzie Nthenge, who founded the sect in 2003, is on trial in the coastal city of Malindi. He is suspected of having urged his followers to starve themselves to death in order to meet Jesus.
Mackenzie Nthenge is suspected, along with 13 other people, of murder, kidnapping and cruelty to children, according to court documents seen by AFP.
In Kenya’s second largest city, Mombasa, the second leader, Ezekiel Odero, will appear before a court. Odero is suspected of murder, assisted suicide, abduction, radicalization, crimes against humanity, fraud and money laundering.
The prosecutor wants Ezekiel Odero to be detained for another month.
The mass death within the sect has prompted Kenyan President William Ruto to intervene against the country’s wild flora of various home-grown religious sects.
This week, a special effort will start, the purpose of which is to control how “we regulate religious activities in our country and how we ensure that we do not encroach on the freedom of religion, opinion and belief”, says Minister of the Interior Kithure Kindiki.
– But at the same time, we cannot allow criminals to use those freedoms to injure, kill, torture and starve people to death, says Kithure Kindiki.