Five Administration Police Service (APS) officers were killed in an ambush in Lamu’s Boni Forest by suspected alshabaab militants on Tuesday night.

The National Police Service headquarters also said five other police officers from the elite Special Operations Group (SOG) were injured during the incident in the Lehelo area and were flown to Nairobi for specialized treatment.

The officers were ambushed when they were pursuing the militants believed to be operating in the expansive forest. They had been trailing the terrorists for two days following intelligence they were hiding in the forest and planned a large-scale attack.

It was then that they ran into an ambush by a large group of terrorists who were waiting leading to the deaths from both sides.

“An SOG team was deployed and embarked on a pursuit patrol to locate enemy forces in Boni Forest within Janjana areas. After two days of patrolling the team had a contact with a large enemy force in the Lehelo area,” the SOG command said.

The deceased officers include a Corporal and four police constables while the five other injured officers are all of the rank of constable.

The attack came just a day after five other quarry workers were killed in an attack while on the way to their workplace in Bur Abor Village in Mandera East, Mandera County.

The killing of the workers on Monday brings to over 100, the number of quarry workers, mainly Christians from outside the county, killed in Mandera in the last ten years.

Detectives said preliminary investigations linked the attack to Al shabaab militants who had been spotted in the area earlier before the attack.

“All the victims were non locals who were working at a quarry for a living. They have been excavating stones for construction in the area,” police said.

Witnesses said the militants ambushed a vehicle with the workers by blocking the road with stones before attacking them at around 7am.