Uneasy calm returns to Addis Ababa

An uneasy calm has returned to the Ethiopian capital a day after riot police across Addis Ababa fired guns to quell a second day of protests against the country's disputed parliamentary elections.

Police killed at least 23 people and wounded dozens more, hospital doctors and health workers said.

Doctors at five hospitals said the bodies of 23 people killed in the clashes were brought to emergency rooms and at least 150 people were treated for injuries, including a seven-year-old boy who was shot in the hip.

Earlier the hospital count was 27 dead and there was no explanation for the revision. Doctors refused to give their names for fear of reprisals.

Information Minister Berhan Hailu said the figures were exaggerated, and said 11 civilians and one police officer were killed, and 54 officers and 28 civilians were injured.

Adam Melaku, head of the independent Ethiopian Human Rights Council, on Wednesday revised earlier figures his group gave of 33 people killed, saying that they now had established that they believed at least eight people were killed in the fighting. He did not give any explanation for the revision or the higher number given earlier in the day.

He said demonstrators burned several buses and destroyed four houses, but that calm was returning to the streets of the city of three million people later. He said the government was "sorry and sad" for the violence, but he blamed it on the main opposition party.

There were reports of a massive wave of arrests as federal police went from house to house, detaining young men. Diplomats said around 2,000 people had been arrested.

Businesses were closed and taxis were off the streets in the city. It was unclear whether this was part of a silent protest against the electoral results and subsequent crackdown.

The violence followed clashes on Tuesday between protesters and police that killed eight people and wounded 43 others. Those renewed clashes erupted after 30 taxi drivers were arrested on Monday for participating in demonstrations against the May 15 parliamentary elections - a vote seen as a test of Prime Minister Zenawi Meles' commitment to reform.