DHAKA, Bangladesh, Mar. 13, 2006

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(AP) Riot police fired tear gas in Bangladesh's capital on Monday to disperse hundreds of stone-throwing activists who tried to march in support of a general strike, witnesses said.

Several people were injured in the violence in central Dhaka, according to an Associated Press photographer at the scene. Police were seen detaining about two dozen protesters.

The violence erupted after about 400 protesters, many of them throwing stones at police, tried to overrun barbed-wire barricades erected by police to stop them from taking to the streets.

Police responded by swinging batons and firing tear gas at the activists, witnesses said.

A nationwide strike was called by the Bangladesh Youth League, the youth wing of the main opposition party, the Awami League, to protest the killing of one of its members last week, allegedly by security forces.

The strike affected schools and shops and disrupted traffic in many cities and towns. Such strikes are a common opposition tactic in Bangladesh, an impoverished nation plagued by political violence.

Imam Ali, a leader of the youth league, died Thursday, hours after he was arrested by the Rapid Action Battalion, an elite anti-crime force, on extortion charges.

Authorities said Ali was killed after his supporters attacked security forces who were escorting him to a police station, a claim rejected by the youth league and by Ali's family. The league said Ali was targeted because he stood up against harassment of local people by security forces.