MANCHESTER, N.H. — While campaigning in New Hampshire, Barack Obama worked the international phone lines to urge an end to the violence that erupted in his father’s home country of Kenya following disputed election results there.
Obama said he contacted Kenyan opposition leader Raila Odinga by phone Monday and hoped to also speak with Kenyan President Mwai Kibaki.
Kibaki was declared the winner of last week’s presidential election, but allegations of vote-rigging have been followed by widespread ethnic clashes, the burning of villages and a growing humanitarian crisis. International mediators are trying to broker a political settlement, but Odinga said Tuesday that he would not attend an unmediated meeting with Kibaki.
Obama said Odinga, who has charged that Kibaki stole the election, “indicated that he would be prepared to meet with Kibaki.”
“What I urged was that all the leaders there . . . tell their supporters to stand down, to desist with the violence and resolve it in a peaceful way,” Obama said.
Obama’s father was from western Kenya. Obama’s father and Odinga are from the same tribe, the Luo.
