Nairobi, April 7 (IANS): Kenyan police said on Tuesday they have arrested 24 suspects of Somali origin who were in the country illegally.

Nakuru county Commissioner Mohammed Birik said eight aliens were arrested at a roadblock in Gilgil town as they were fleeing from Nairobi to Uganda on Monday night.

"Those arrested in Gilgil were on their way to court while those nabbed in Nakuru are being interrogated," Birik told Xinhua news agency over telephone.

He said 16 other aliens were arrested in Nakuru county during a major swoop over the Easter holiday.

The arrests came as police intensified their patrols and roadblocks along the highway after the Garissa University College attack in northeastern Kenya on Thursday that left 148 people dead.

The security swoop also comes amid heightened security in Kenya after Somali insurgents threatened reprisal attacks if the Kenyan troops which launched cross border incursions in 2011 did not leave the Horn of Africa nation.

Birik noted that in the wake of the terror attack in Garissa, some of the suspects could be fleeing from Nairobi.