Kenya's president vowed Wednesday to keep troops in Somalia to fight Islamist Shebab rebels, apparently dismissing suggestions the country may be drawing up an exit strategy in order to focus on attacks on its own soil.

Kenyan troops crossed into Somalia in 2011 to fight the Al-Qaida-affiliated insurgents, and later joined the African Union force, AMISOM, which is supporting Somalia's internationally-backed government.

A British jihadist fighting for Somalia's al-Qaida affiliate, the Shebab, is believed to have been killed in a thwarted attack on a Kenyan army base, a Kenyan defense spokesman said.

Thomas Evans is believed to have been among a group of militants who launched a pre-dawn raid Sunday on a Kenyan army base in Baure, close to the border with Somalia.

Suspected Shebab gunmen raided a Kenyan military base and briefly took over a village Sunday in the latest attacks highlighting the insecurity that plagues parts of the country.

Both attacks in Lamu county on Kenya's coast close to the border with Somalia, were blamed on the Somali-led al-Qaida affiliate that has in recent months focused more attention on Kenya.

More than a thousand young men and women from northeast Kenya began a 800 kilometer (500 mile) peace march this weekend against rampant insecurity and terrorism in the region.

The "Walk of Hope" from Garissa, where gunmen killed close to 150 people in April, to Mandera, where militants launch regular raids and ambushes, is designed to draw attention to the frequent terrorist attacks launched by the Shebab, a Somali-led al-Qaida affiliate.

Two Kenyan rights groups welcomed a court injunction Thursday blocking the government from declaring them as terrorist groups, although their bank accounts remain frozen.

The two key Muslim civil society organizations, HAKI Africa and Muslims for Human Rights (MUHURI), had their activities suspended in April for suspected links to Somalia's al-Qaida-linked Shebab, and were placed on a list of 85 individuals and organizations accused of supporting the Islamists.

Three people have died in an attack by suspected Shebab militants in Kenya's northeastern Wajir county that borders Somalia, officials said Sunday.

Wajir county's police commander, Samuel Mukindia, said a group of gunmen opened fire in a residential area late on Saturday, killing two men and a women before escaping.

Five men arrested in connection with the Garissa university massacre in April were charged in a Kenyan court on Thursday with terrorism, officials said.

The charge sheet read out to the suspects stated that they conspired to commit a terrorist act on April 2nd, on the day 148 people -- most of them students -- were killed at the college.

From hit and run attacks and massacres to a shopping trip, Somali-led Shebab militants are on the march in northeastern Kenya.

With large numbers of troops in southern Somalia but seemingly unable to effectively police its own outer regions, Kenya must react quickly to stop the al-Qaeda-affiliated Islamists from gaining significant ground and finding a new generation of recruits, Western security officials say.

Kenyan President Uhuru Kenyatta said Friday that regional leaders would bring "new impetus" to moribund efforts aimed at ending 17 months of civil war in South Sudan.

Talks hosted by regional bloc IGAD have only achieved broken promises and failed ceasefires as the warring parties continue to seek battlefield victories, while parallel talks in Arusha have done little more than confuse the issues.

A Kenyan man pleaded guilty to supporting three different terrorist organizations Thursday, admitting to providing money and recruits in Syria and Somalia, the U.S. Justice Department said.  

The suspect, 27-year-old Mohamed Hussein Said, is accused of providing material support to "foreign terrorist organizations," according to a statement from the Justice Department.