KENYAN President Mwai Kibaki has declared food shortages ravaging parts of the east African country a "national disaster" and for the first time used the word "famine" to describe the crisis.

Kenyan police are trying to determine the identity of a man they arrested believing he was involved in the 1998 bombing of the US Embassy in Kenya that killed more than 200 people.

Police have captured a man who allegedly took part in the 1998 bombing of the American embassy in Kenya.