Over 2 dozen children among 33 bodies pulled from Kenyan mass grave: authorities

Detectives exhumed the remains of 25 children and eight adults, as well as dismembered body parts packed in gunny sacks, from a mass grave at a church-owned cemetery in Kericho, authorities said.

"We were able to establish that these were bodies transferred from Nyamira District Hospital to a private cemetery in Kericho," Mohamed Amin, who leads the Directorate of Criminal Investigations, told reporters.

Government pathologists conducted autopsies Thursday to determine the cause of death, though the identities of the victims have not been released.

Authorities have arrested two people in connection with the case.

Local media reported the bodies were transported in a government vehicle by unidentified individuals and buried hastily, with some gravediggers later alerting police.

"We need authorities to conduct a thorough investigation," resident Brian Kibunja said.

Another resident, Samuel Moso, said authorities should "reveal if the government was involved or if a different group of people was behind the mass burial."

There have been three major mass-grave incidents in Kenya over the past three years.

In 2024, authorities recovered nine bodies from a dumpsite in Nairobi, the Eastern African nation's capital.

Missing Voices, a human rights group, said it documented 125 extrajudicial killings and six enforced disappearances in Kenya over the past year, compared to 104 reported killings the year before.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.