48 dead in Kenyan clashes over land

An official says 48 people have been killed in clashes over land between pastoral and farming communities in Kenya's southeast.

Tana river district police chief Joseph Kavoo said today that some people were burnt in their houses, others hacked to death or shot with arrows.

Resident Said Mgeni says the attacks began at dawn where a group of about 200 people belonging to the Pokomo ethnic group and who are farmers raided a village in the Riketa area and torched all the houses belonging to the Orma, a pastoralist community.

Mgeni says a majority of those who died are women and children. Last week the Orma attacked the Pokomo.

AP