Report says leaders at fault in Kenya

"As the country slid into interethnic violence, there were examples of the police intervening to protect lives, but in many other situations the police appear to have had little will or capacity to prevent violence."

Human Rights Watch report

World had to accept some blame for the violence that rocked Kenya following a disputed election in December, killing more than 1,000 people, the international Human Rights Watch group said yesterday.

The report by the New York-based group also found that police shot hundreds of people protesting the election result in Nairobi, the western port town of Kisumu and other towns between late December and early January.

In many cases, it said, witnesses reported that the police had not acted in self-defense and had not been provoked.

"Foreign governments should remember that decades of turning a blind eye to corruption, impunity and mismanagement by Kenya's governments has contributed to the recent crisis," the group said in its report.

The world was shocked at the bloodshed in Kenya, previously seen as a haven of stability on a volatile continent, and many leaders helped pressure Kenyan President Mwai Kibaki and opposition leader Raila Odinga into a Feb. 28 power-sharing pact.

Human Rights Watch accused police of causing "hundreds" of deaths by resorting to excessive force during the two-month crisis in the East African country, especially in opposition strongholds like Kisumu.

Fleeing had been shot, the group said in its 88-page report.

It also criticized authorities for acting impartially. Lethal force was used quickly in opposition areas but restraint was shown toward pro-government supporters, it said.

"As the country slid into interethnic violence, there were examples of the police intervening to protect lives, but in many other situations the police appear to have had little will or capacity to prevent violence," the report said.

"The ethnic divisions laid bare in the aftermath of the elections have roots that run much deeper than the presidential poll," the report said.

"No Kenyan government has yet made a good-faith effort to address long simmering grievances over land that have persisted since independence," it said.

"Lasting solutions require a thorough overhaul of Kenyan institutions and a serious attempt to redress deep-seated problems that have been ignored or exacerbated for too long by those in power," said the report, titled Ballots to Bullets: Organized Political Violence and Kenya's Crisis of Governance.

It said that the deep-seated problems include, "the ownership and allocation of land, the Constitution, and impunity for corruption and the organization of political violence."

The report was based on 200 interviews with victims, witnesses, perpetrators, police, magistrates, diplomats, Kenyan and international NGO staff, journalists, lawyers, businessmen, councilors and members of parliament across the country.

The crisis was Kenya's worst since independence from Britain in 1963 and damaged its international reputation as a prosperous trade and tourism hub.

Kenya is East Africa's biggest economy.

Human Rights Watch blamed successive post-independence governments for failing to address land and poverty issues at the root of the violence.

"Much of the ethnic-based violence was organized by local leaders, politicians and businessmen from all sides, according to eyewitnesses," it said.

"Human Rights Watch believes that there is no alternative to criminal prosecutions of those who have contributed to the violence, including for members of the police found to have used excessive force," the report said.

"Kenya's leaders, Kenyan civil society, and international actors deserve praise for uniting and bringing the country back from the brink," said Georgette Gagnon, Africa director at Human Rights Watch.

"But the hard work starts now. Confronting long-ignored human rights violations and historical injustices means investigations and prosecutions," she said.