Kenya Death Toll Near 800 in a Month

NAIVASHA, Kenya — Gangs of youths armed with machetes and clubs fought running battles with police on Sunday and burned tribal rivals alive in their homes in western Kenya, pushing the death toll from a month of escalating ethnic violence to nearly 800.

Sunday marked exactly one month since the Dec. 27 disputed president election which sparked the violence that has transformed this once-stable African country, pitting longtime neighbors against each other and turning towns where tourists used to gather for luxury holidays into no-go zones.

It also complicated the task of former U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan, the latest international mediator trying to promote talks between President Mwai Kibaki and his chief rival, opposition leader Raila Odinga. The two met Thursday for the first time since the election.

Kibaki and Odinga remain far apart on how to resolve the crisis, the worst the country has seen since its 1963 independence from Britain. Kibaki has said he is open to direct talks with Odinga, but that his position as president is not negotiable. Odinga says Kibaki must step down and new elections are the only alternative.

The clashes have mainly pitted other ethnic groups, which support the opposition because they feel marginalized, against Kibaki's Kikuyu people.

Kikuyus were the main victims in the initial eruption of violence, with hundreds killed and more than half of those driven from their homes belonging to Kibaki's tribe. Now, however, it appears the Kikuyus are looking for revenge.

"We have moved out to avenge the deaths of our brothers and sisters who have been killed, and nothing will stop us," said Anthony Mwangi, hefting a club in the western town of Naivasha. "For every one Kikuyu killed, we shall avenge their killing with three."

The fighting spread Sunday to Naivasha, 55 miles northwest of Nairobi, a previously quiet tourist town with a stunning freshwater lake.

At least 22 people were killed in the town over the weekend, said district commissioner Katee Mwanza. At least five of them were burned to death in their homes, said Willy Lugusa, a police official. Others were hacked to death with machetes, a local reporter told The Associated Press.

Kikuyus torched the homes of Luo rivals in the center of Navaisha. Police, apparently overwhelmed, did not intervene. Gunshots rang out into the evening.

Looters used iron bars to smash the windows of shops belonging to non-Kikuyu businesspeople, and made off with television sets, groceries and clothing.

One woman came screaming down the road from a blazing house.

"They set it on fire, they are killing my brother and sister," Alice Okoth said.

Mike Aringo, a 27-year-old resident, said hundreds of men swarmed the area Sunday morning.

"They told us if you are a Luo, you will be killed today," Aringo said. Odinga is a Luo.

Soldiers and police reinforcements arrived late Sunday afternoon, firing tear gas and live bullets. Downtown Naivasha quickly became deserted, but on the outskirts, gangs of youths armed with machetes and clubs engaged in running battles with police who chased them down alleyways.

In the city of Nakuru, the provincial capital of Kenya's fertile Rift Valley where ethnic clashes erupted late Thursday, some 55 bodies were counted Sunday at the morgue, said a morgue attendant who asked not to be named because he was not authorized to speak to the media.

Bodies were still arriving Sunday, although the running battles had largely cooled off. A local newspaper reporter saw another five bodies Sunday in two slums on the outskirts of Nakuru.

The latest deaths brought the toll in a month of violence to nearly 800 killed.

Odinga met with Annan on Sunday and opposition spokesman Salim Lone said they were asked to name three negotiators for talks, which he said he would hopefully start "within a week."

Comments

[hgmichna]

10:31 AM on 01/28/2008

Most people in the know would probably say that Naivasha and Nakuru lie in central Kenya. They are in the Rift Valley and in the Rift Valley Province, not in the Western Province, and Naivasha is only 77 km (straight) from Nairobi.

Naivasha proper is a very small town, just a few houses and a few shops and restaurants along two paved streets, but it has sprawling settlements and some industry around it. All these towns, like Naivasha and the much bigger Nakuru, are inhabited by an ethnic mix, always containing some Kikuyu.

[Beve83]

08:12 PM on 01/27/2008

Please read this:

http://www.spiegel.de/international/spiegel/0,1518,363663,00.html

[Waitaminute]

05:29 PM on 01/27/2008

Most conflicts, no matter what continent has more to do with economic differences, then anything else. Allowing every group the opportunity to excel, gain and have financial inspirations are the key. Sometimes governments give pacifiers to the less financially stable, to keep them quiet. I am not saying this is right or wrong, But it usually keep conflict down.

Most people who feel they are reasonally financially comfortable, are less likely to fight. So until or unless there are sufficient number of people in each tribe, religion who feel they are well to do, or comfortable, there will always be conflict. The tribal even the religious lines are blurred when people are doing and feel good.

Thats was done in the United States, to keep potential violence down between the races. Most people are to busy partying, driving their BMWs, living in their big houses. They don't want to start conflicts. Because they may lose their job, their cars. In other word they feel they have to much to lose.

The mistake a lot of leaders make. They don't do enough for enough people, to keep the neglected from attempting the overthrow of that leadership.

I know very little about the continent of Africa and Kenya in particular. I think A president Barack Obama would say, there is no Ibo, Yoruba, THERE IS NO CHRISTIAN , MUSLIM, there is only ONE Kenya. In KENYA we don't want anybody telling us, what rights the Ibo's have as opposed to what rights the Yoruba's have. all Kenyans HAVE THE SAME RIGHTS, BECAUSE WE ARE ALL KENYANS. Now lets find away where people put the fact that they are all KENYANS.

[forpeace]

02:13 PM on 01/27/2008

*

Why is the whole world turning up side down?!

SAD!

*

[forpeace]

01:53 PM on 01/27/2008

*

Isn't it time for Bush to Invade Kenya yet?!

*

[larry278]

01:52 PM on 01/27/2008

The world goes on while the USA plays politics & W & Co masturbate. Whom ever becomes POTUS on 1/20/09 will have a big job in dealing with Afghanistan, Iraq, Pakistan & the rest of the world with an empty treasury & broken armed forces. Have any of the candidates been examined by a shrink in '07 or '08? All of them need to be evaluated by a team of shrinks at once. You have to be nuts to want to be POTUS now.

[gigiz]

01:32 PM on 01/27/2008

Although the US and other western nations often prop up states that have no business being states, they also frequently undermine states for the purposes of profit as well. The US, Belgium, France and Britain all encouraged the secessionist movement in the Katanga province after Zaire gained independence from Belgium because the Lumumba government was not sufficiently disposed to having western mineral companies' enjoying the kind of access that they would have liked to what has been called "the Persian gulf of minerals." Whether the US supports failed states and so called nation building or covertly supports denationalization depends on which political scenario best suits the interests of the corporations with material interests in the region at any given moment in time.

[ceasenake]

01:09 PM on 01/27/2008

I've been to Kenya and found it to be pretty nice.

It's usually pretty peaceful there, compared to most of the continent of Africa, which for the most part is a total basket case.

[factanonverba]

12:09 PM on 01/27/2008

Dealing with the colonial legacy is the biggest headache facing much of the world and it is why we prop up failed states because the alternative is chaos. US foreign policy has opposed the creation of new nation states effectively since the 1970s. We resisted East Timor, in part to placate the Indonesians but also because if one new state comes into being then others might follow suit.

While the US espoused the fall of communism, it did not advocate for the split up of the USSR apart from the Baltics which remained recognized as independent states from when they were independent in the inter-war period. Clinton's initial policy on Yugoslavia was to try to keep it together. Mine was the opposite. Break it apart. Quickly. Undo the tension and the international system will gravitate again towards to stability because it always does.

I recognize that both the Treaty of Berlin (1885) and the Treaty of Versailles (1919) are responsible for the tension in the international system today. From Sudan to Burma to Iraq to Rwanda to Pakistan, the problems stems from this pervasive legacy of colonialism that created artificial states.

Take Ethiopia. Once Eritrea was separated, a thirty year war was ended. Border tensions remain but large-scale fighting has ceased. The deadliest war since WW II is now being fought in the former Zaire. Sudan and Zimbabwe are a mess. Liberia, Sierra Leone, Angola and Mozambique are just beginning to emerge from twenty year wars. The Ivory Coast, once Africa's miracle, has plunged into civil war. Chad, the CAR, Niger, Nigeria, the Sudan, and Somalia have always been tense. Relatively stable Kenya is now on the verge of chaos. This is the result of colonialism that created political entities where existed before dividing peoples and uniting groups that long had mutual hostility. Rwanda April 1994 only the most painful example. Kenya January 2008 pales in comparison but its only difference with Rwanda is scale.

[Wrong2bRight]

12:07 PM on 01/27/2008

This is because of Iraq. Bush, get our troops out of Iraq.

[nihilon x]

11:35 AM on 01/27/2008

The fight against corruption and for true democracy continues.

Here's hoping that a peaceful resolution is found as quickly as possible.

[MikeMidCity]

11:32 AM on 01/27/2008

Barack Obama as a grandson of Kenya could/would bring a prospective to the situation that has never been brought to Africa.

A President of the United States who has an interest in the African future.