MOGADISHU, Jan 21: Kenya has sent about 30 prisoners shackled hand-and-foot on a plane to Somalia after arresting them near the border on suspicion of belonging to an ousted Islamist movement, their representatives said on Sunday.

The deportees, who a lawyer said included one Canadian and three Eritreans, were among scores of suspected Islamist fighters and supporters rounded up by Kenyan forces after a war that ended the movement's six-month rule of south Somalia.

The Somali government said they included some senior officials of the former Somalia Islamic Courts Council (SICC).

“We thank the Kenyan government and other Horn of Africa nations for their outstanding cooperation dealing with terrorism issues,” Abdirahman Dinari said. “If there is a case against them, they will go to the courts. If not, they will be freed.”

The deportees arrived in Mogadishu late on Saturday and were put in custody of Ethiopian soldiers, government sources said.

“They were shackled with chains on their feet and handcuffs on their hands behind their backs,” Kenyan lawyer Harun Ndubi said. “Ethiopia regards them as an enemy, so I really fear they could face the same fate as Saddam Hussein now.”

Ndubi said 34 were deported, while Dinari said 30.

Ndubi said the transferred prisoners included a Canadian citizen, Bashir Ahmed Makhtat, who had told him he ran a second-hand clothes business in the region and was trying to cross the border overland when the war blocked other routes.

Three other prisoners were from Eritrea -- Ethiopia's arch-foe -- and had also identified themselves as businessmen, involved in the charcoal trade, he said.—AFP