Under US pressure, Kibaki offered a power-sharing arrangement with Odinga but has refused to step down as president. She is seeking to shore up the Kibaki regime and bring Odinga into a government of national unity. Kenya is a key ally in the “war against terror.” The US assistant secretary of state for Africa, Jendayi Frazer, was dispatched to Nairobi to attempt a negotiated settlement. The deteriorating situation has a produced a crisis for the United States. The medical charity Merlin told the BBC that food and water supplies are “dangerously low,” sparking fears of health risks from diarrhoea, infection and dehydration. UN World Food Programme trucks carrying 2,500 tons of supplies have been unable to move because of the insecure situation. The International Committee of the Red Cross said that around half a million people required aid and, according to the United Nations, at least 250,000 have been forced to flee their homes and need shelter. Only vehicles with military escorts can move about.Ī large-scale humanitarian crisis is now developing. Roadblocks have been set up by armed gangs from different ethnic groups. In some cases, members of the Luo tribe have taken their Kikuyu neighbours into their own homes to protect them. They are sheltering in churches and police stations. In the Rift Valley area, scene of some of the worst ethnic attacks, some 100,000 are in need of food. In the western city of Kisumu, an Odinga stronghold, thousands of members of the Kikuyu and other tribes perceived to be supporters of the incumbent president have been forced to leave town on buses. Vast numbers of people have been displaced from mixed areas. The violence that took place in the 1990s was not on this scale. Tribal violence has been unheard of in Kenya for more than a decade. Violence of tribal origin is the worst it knows no limits and is extremely difficult to quell.” Alexandre Liebeskind, deputy head of Red Cross operations for the Horn of Africa, told the Los Angeles Times, “The level of hatred is very high. Members of the Kikuyu tribe associated with President Kibaki are being singled out for attacks by shadowy gangs. British Channel 4 News showed police firing live rounds at demonstrators in the slums of Nairobi, with doctors at a local clinic saying half of those they were treating had been injured by the police. Human Rights Watch has denounced the “excessive use of force by the police and military” against protesters supporting the opposition candidate, Raila Odinga. The dead are the victims of brutal policing and ethnic clashes. The total continues to rise, with no sign that a political resolution is in sight. More than 350 are estimated to have been killed in almost two weeks of violence following the rigged presidential elections in Kenya.
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