Kenyan lawyer found alive after Nairobi abduction

Kenyan lawyer Ahmedsadak Abdi Abshir has been found alive nearly two weeks after armed men seized him in Nairobi, his family said on Thursday.

His brother Zakariah Abshir told AFP that Abshir had called the family and had been dumped in Sololo, in Marsabit County, about 700 kilometres from Nairobi. He said the lawyer was at Sololo police station.

Abshir, 30, went missing on November 1. Video shared by Kenyan media and rights groups showed armed men pursuing him before bundling him into a car.

Abshir had been representing a businessman in a fraud case. The businessman had filed a complaint against security services for threatening him, and Abshir later filed his own complaint saying he had also received threats from security services.

Amnesty International called on authorities to establish what happened during the time Abshir was missing, identify everyone involved in his abduction and hold them to account. The rights group said it had recorded at least 22 cases of enforced disappearance in Kenya this year.

Around 100 lawyers and rights activists protested Abshir's disappearance on Tuesday. Law Society of Kenya president Charles Kanjama said state agents or agencies pursuing him included the Anti-Terror Police Unit and the National Intelligence Service. Kenyan police denied holding the lawyer.