Kenyans count bodies in post-election battleground

By Tim Cocks

NAKURU, Kenya (Reuters) - Bodies of murdered Kenyans piled up in Nakuru mortuary on Saturday. Some adults, some children. Some bore the machete blows, spear thrusts and arrow shots that probably finished them off.

All had been burned, their limbs and digits curled up and faces rigid as if frozen in horror.

At least 27 people have been killed in the past two days in clashes between rival ethnic gangs in Nakuru, a lakeside town nestled in a breathtaking stretch of Kenya's Rift Valley that was once a hit with tourists.

Until Friday, it had escaped weeks of violence that has killed at least 700 people in the east African country and forced 250,000 from their homes since a disputed December 27 election returned President Mwai Kibaki to power.

Not anymore. As police unloaded sixteen burnt bodies off the back of a pick-up truck, a crowd stood by in shock, looking away as each corpse was dumped. A woman wailed and ran away.

"I've never experienced this in Kenya," said a sharply dressed man in a navy polo shirt, his face streaming with tears. "I just pray that our leaders end this thing quickly."

Kibaki's rival Raila Odinga, who lost by a narrow margin in a vote international observers say was flawed, claims rigging.

Many have died in clashes between rival tribes that have exposed the deep ethnic fault lines in the nation's politics.