Kenya: Clinton Urges Peaceful Polls

Nairobi — US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton met with Kenyan leaders Saturday to discuss the need for fair upcoming elections

US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton met with Kenyan leaders Saturday to discuss regional security and the need for fair upcoming elections, to avoid a repeat of deadly post-poll violence four years ago.

Clinton, who arrived in Kenya Saturday on the latest leg of her Africa tour, met with Kenyan President Mwai Kibaki, which will be followed by talks with Prime Minister Raila Odinga.

She is later due to meet the outgoing leaders of war-torn Somalia's transitional government, due to end later this month an eight-year interim period marred by infighting, minimal political progress and rampant corruption.

Ravaged by repeated droughts and over two decades of conflict, Somalia is torn between rival clans, Al-Qaeda linked insurgents and the Western-backed government, propped up by a 17,000-strong African Union force.

Kenya, which invaded Somalia last year before joining the AU force, is a key US ally and closely linked to Washington's efforts to quash Islamist movements in the volatile Horn of Africa region.

One person was killed in a grenade attack in a Nairobi suburb late Friday, the latest in a string of blasts in Kenya since its troops invaded southern Somalia to crush extremist insurgent bases there last year.

But Clinton is expected to focus on Kenya's internal challenges, as East Africa's economic powerhouse gears up for a March general election, the first since post-electoral violence four years ago.

Kenya plunged into violence after the December 2007 election in which Odinga -- then opposition chief -- accused Kibaki as the incumbent president of having rigged his re-election.

What began as political riots soon turned into ethnic killings targeting members of Kibaki's Kikuyu tribe, who in turn launched reprisal attacks in the country's worst violence since independence in 1963.

Kibaki will not contest the next election.

Two presidential hopefuls, Deputy Prime Minister Uhuru Kenyatta and former minister William Ruto, face trial in April in the International Criminal Court for crimes against humanity over the post-election killings, charges they deny.

They face counts including orchestrating murder, rape and persecution in the aftermath of the poll.

Clinton, who visited neighbouring Uganda and South Sudan on Friday, is due to travel to Malawi on Sunday.

On Friday she called for a "compromise" deal between rivals in Juba and Khartoum to resume oil production, stalled in a bitter dispute that brought the newly separated rivals to the brink of all-out war earlier this year.

Hours later, in the early hours of Saturday morning, African Union mediator Thabo Mbeki said that the "parties have agreed on all of the financial arrangements regarding oil."

Mbeki said a timetable would now be drawn up for the resumption of oil production and exports, which are vital to the economies of both deeply impoverished countries.