Some of the attackers who massacred shoppers in a Nairobi mall were men dressed as women, according to reports.
A Kenyan minister said all of the militants, thought to belong to the al-Shabaab group, were men - scotching rumours that the notorious 'White Widow', a 29-year-old British woman, was involved.
Samantha Lewthwaite, the Buckinghamshire-born widow of 7/7 bomber Jermaine Lindsay, is wanted by Kenyan police over terrorism links.
There were reports of a white woman being involved in the attack, that killed at least 65 people including four British nationals.
But Kenya's interior minister, Joseph Ole Lenku, confirmed the attackers were men, although some had dressed as women, Channel 4 News reported.
The militants were described as "a multinational collection from all over the world."
Lewthwaite has gained "semi-mythical status" since travelling to the region, a terror expert said.
Raffaello Pantucci, a senior research fellow at the Royal United Services Institute, said: "There has been a lot of speculation about it. Samantha Lewthwaite, since she appeared in East Africa, has been elevated in some ways to a semi-mythical status.
"I don't think we've had any concrete evidence of her being involved in this incident, but the fact of her being mentioned in this context is not surprising because of her connections, and it is known that she is somewhere in East Africa."
In March last year officials said that she had fled to Somalia, and that police were hunting a woman who used several identities, including hers.
Her mass killer husband, Lindsay, 19, carried out the most deadly of the July 7 attacks, claiming 26 lives.