At Least 3 Dead in New Violence in Southeast Kenya

Tribesmen launched new attacks in Kenya's southeastern Tana River area early Tuesday, torching houses and killing at least three police officers, police sources said.

Officers said armed groups were burning houses and shooting indiscriminately in the Semikaro area in the region's latest round of ethnic violence.

"Three people have been killed and six others have been wounded seriously," a senior police officer told Agence France Presse.

The fresh attacks came just hours after Kenyan president Mwai Kibaki ordered a dusk-to-dawn curfew in the remote area in the country's coastal region, after tribesmen attacked a village, torched homes and sparked clashes that killed 38 people Monday.

"Things are not very good there, there has been a problem there since early morning but we are handling it," regional police chief Aggrey Adoli said.

Caleb Kilunde, a Red Cross official in the area said initial reports indicated four villages were attacked.

"Police have been outnumbered and have retreated and are waiting for reinforcements," Kilunde said.

Kibaki also ordered the deployment of additional security personnel to the area where around 100 people have died in the ethnic violence that began last month.

"The government will get to the bottom of the matter ... local leaders must also take a proactive role and preach peace among area residents," Kibaki said in a statement.

On Monday at least 300 Pokomo tribesmen stormed Kilelengwani, a village near some of the east African country's most idyllic beaches, and attacked members of the Orma community. A Red Cross official said nine policemen were among those killed.

The vendetta between the Pokomo farming community and their Orma pastoralist neighbors already left 52 dead last month in Kenya's worst tribal killings in years.

The latest violence follows warnings last month by Gullet that over 200 Kenyans had been killed in ethnic clashes since January.

Many of the attacks -- often small-scale tit-for-tat raids between rival ethnic groups in remote and impoverished rural regions -- generate little attention.

They are often blamed on tensions between communities sparked by land, grazing or water resources, not politics.

But the latest pattern of violence has conjured up the spectra of the large-scale ethnic violence that erupted in the aftermath of disputed 2007 polls.

The bloodletting at the time revealed the fragility of a country that had long been considered a rock of stability in the region and some observers fear a surge in violence ahead of a fresh election.