PARIS - Kidnappers who seized a wheelchair-bound French woman, who later died in Somalia, are now trying to sell her body, France's defence minister said

Marie Dedieu, 66, a cancer sufferer, was abducted on October 1 from a private house on the island of Manda on Kenya's northern coast.

Dedieu died, probably after her captors failed to give her the daily medication she needed.

"You have to know that the hostage takers are even looking to sell her body ... It is completely disgusting," Defence Minister Gerard Longuet said on i-Tele TV.

"Letting her get blood poisoning, which is what she probably died of, and then trying to sell her body (shows) that these people only deserve contempt," Longuet said.

Meanwhile, Kenya would use all measures necessary to protect its territory, President Mwai Kibaki said yesterday in his first comments since Nairobi sent troops into southern Somalia.

"We will defend our territorial integrity through all measures necessary to ensure peace and stability," Kibaki told a meeting in the capital.

Kenya is working closely with the Transitional Federal Government of Somalia and the African Union, he said.

"Each one of us has a role to ensure that no one among us is used to disrupt our peace and stability. We should all be vigilant, and as true patriots ensure that we identify the bad elements among us.

"The hospitality of the Kenyan people must never be abused by some bad elements," Kibaki said in an apparent reference to possible Islamist infiltrators among Somali refugees.

The government would provide "adequate security in all parts of the country", he said.