President Uhuru Kenyatta holds talks with UK Prime Minister Theresa May in London. [Photo/ PSCU]
President Uhuru Kenyatta on Thursday met UK Prime Minister Theresa May in London where they discussed Kenya’s counter-terrorism programme in the context of deepening the security architecture for Kenya and the region.
The Prime Minister made commitment to support the programme.
President Kenyatta is in Britain to attend the Third London Conference on Somalia.
The President also pressed for the re-establishment of a UK visa processing centre in Nairobi, to serve as a regional office for Eastern and Central Africa.
Currently UK visas for the region are processed in the South African capital Pretoria.
President Kenyatta praised the PM for lifting the travel advisories that had adversely affected Lamu and Manda Island — which he said would lead to a significant increase in tourist arrivals from the UK. He reassured her that the government had taken extensive measures to bolster security in the area.
The meeting between President Kenyatta was the latest in high-profile meetings between the two countries. UK Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson visited Kenya last year while President Kenyatta met the then UK Prime Minister David Cameron on the margins of the United Nations General Assembly in New York in September 2015.
Miraa also featured in the London talks. President Kenyatta asked PM May to extend technical cooperation and financial assistance to Miraa growing areas to enable diversification and to minimise negative effects of the export ban to the UK imposed three years ago.
President Kenyatta also spoke of the benefits of mutual legal assistance to both countries, saying it had led to the tracing and repatriation of funds acquired fraudulently by Kenyan officials and stashed away in Jersey accounts.
The President also thanked Britain for continued development aid through the UK agency DFID. He committed to continued transparency in the utilisation of resources from both government and lending agencies, PSCU reports.
The President will separately meet British investors in East Africa, representatives of Kenya’s large UK diaspora.