Apparent pro-government forces clashed with protestors today as thousands of demonstrators marched calling for President Askar Akayev to step down in the first major rally in the Kyrgyz capital since opposition supporters seized control of key cities and towns in the south.

A column of about 5,000 opposition supporters moved down Bishkek’s main avenue, passing the facade of the presidential and government headquarters and halting in the city’s main square adjacent to the white stone building, which was surrounded by helmeted riot police with truncheons and shields. Protesters chanted “Akayev, go!”

Many of the demonstrators had come from a rally on the outskirts of Bishkek, where protesters roared and clapped when an opposition activist asserted that Akayev’s foes would soon control the entire Central Asian nation, which has been plunged into political crisis over disputed parliamentary elections.

“The power is in the people’s hands. Today or tomorrow Bishkek will also be in the people’s hands,” Topchubek Turgunaliyev, an activist of the opposition People’s Movement of Kyrgyzstan, told the crowd from atop a building.

“The people of Kyrgyzstan will not let anybody torment them,” said People’s Movement head Kurmanbek Bakiyev, one of two main leaders of Kyrgyzstan’s fragmented opposition. “We must show persistence and strength, and we will win.”

Meanwhile, the government said it cancelled a trip by Prime Minister Nikolai Tanayev to the rebellious south where he had hoped to meet with opposition activists who have taken control of the country’s second-largest city, Osh, as well as other administrative centres in the past week. No reason was given for the cancellation.

The demonstrators in Bishkek wore pink or yellow headbands signifying their loyalty to the opposition – reminiscent of the orange worn by protesters who helped topple the Ukrainian government last year. At one point, dozens of small children escorted by older youths marched, holding anti-Akayev banners.

“Akayev will certainly go, I’m sure of that 100 per cent,” said Ainura Chekirova, a 29-year-who came with about 40 others from the central city of Naryn. Other demonstrators came from Osh and Jalal-Abad, another southern region whose administration is under opposition control.

Interior Minister Keneshbek Dushebayev addressed the crowd and urged them to obey laws. However, in a departure from his warnings the day before of a possible crackdown that could include “special means and firearms,” he vowed today that no force would be used against peaceful protesters.

“I promise here that force will not be used against the people,” he said. “The law is the law, and whether we like it or not we have to abide by it,” said Dushebayev, to whistles and booing by protesters.

Authorities had sent different signals yesterday, when Akayev appointed Dushebayev to replace a predecessor fired over the unrest in the south and riot police broke up an opposition protest in Bishkek, detaining 20 to 30 people. Dushebayev said all were released.

Government spokeswoman Roza Daudova did not explain why Tanayev’s trip to Osh was cancelled, but she said “other mediators” might seek to defuse the crisis who would seek to defuse the crisis sparked by the election of a predominantly pro-Akayev parliament and concerns that he might seek to stay in power beyond a presidential vote set for October.

The protests began even before the first round of parliamentary elections on February 27 and swelled after March 13 run-offs that the opposition and the Organisation for Security and Co-operation in Europe said were seriously flawed.

Kyrgyzstan lacks the rich energy resources or pipeline routes that have made of some of its neighbours in Central Asia the focus of struggles by Russia, the US and China for regional influence. But the former Soviet republic’s role as a conduit for drugs and a potential hotbed of Islamic extremism, particularly in the impoverished south, makes it volatile.

Kyrgyz officials have made broad accusations that drug traffickers or “extremists” are behind the protests, but there have been no overt indications of Islamist influence among the demonstrators.

The political unrest in Kyrgyzstan comes after peaceful opposition protests led to the ousting of entrenched governments and brought Western-leaning leaders to power in Georgia and Ukraine in the past 18 months – a major shift in the former Soviet Union.

However, the Kyrgyz opposition has use some violence, wielding sticks, stones and home-made gasoline bombs, and burning down a police headquarters in the south. Dozens have been injured.

Akayev, 60, is prohibited from seeking another term, but the opposition has accused him of manipulating the parliamentary vote to gain a compliant legislature that would amend the constitution to allow him to stay in office. Akayev has denied that.