Kenyan opposition accuses police of killing seven

Kenya's opposition accused police of killing seven people on Thursday during a second day of clashes with demonstrators protesting against President Mwai Kibaki's disputed re-election.

In the capital Nairobi, and the western towns of Kisumu and Eldoret, police fired teargas and bullets during rallies called by opposition leader Raila Odinga's Orange Democratic Movement (ODM), but banned by police. More protests are planned on Friday.

Odinga, who accuses Kibaki of stealing victory in the Dec. 27 ballot, said police shot dead seven people in the capital.

"Police are shooting innocent civilians at will ... the government has turned this country into a killing field of innocents," he told reporters.

Police had no immediate comment. ODM member of parliament Elizabeth Ongoro Masha said her driver was among those killed by officers who surrounded part of the Mathare slum overnight.

"They were targeting people perceived as being group leaders," she told Reuters.

Witnesses saw three wounded men carried into a hospital in another Nairobi slum, Kibera. One died from gunshot wounds to the neck, doctors said.

In the opposition stronghold of Kisumu, a witness said police shot dead two men and a woman. Relatives of a 10-year-old boy shot on Wednesday said he had died in hospital.

Three other people were killed there on Wednesday, including a youth seen shot and then kicked by a policeman in footage on local KTN television.

Police said they were attacked first, but there was growing criticism from human rights organisations and others of police tactics.

Kenya's rapid plunge into crisis has tarnished its democratic credentials, horrified world powers, scared off tourists and hurt one of Africa's most promising economies.

In three weeks since the vote, about 650 people have died in killings and clashes between police and protesters.