Residents of Addis Ababa largely stayed home on Friday in a fifth day of renewed protest over the results of May elections the opposition calls fraudulent. There were reports of more scattered gunfire and rioting in parts of the capital.

Diplomats said they had reports of police continuing to round up suspected opposition leaders overnight, perhaps as many as 3 000 people. There were also unconfirmed reports that protests had spread to other parts of the country.

Businesses were closed and taxis were off the streets on Friday morning, and gunfire was reported near the British embassy.

Protesters were throwing stones at buses near the Canadian embassy in a different part of the city, witnesses said.

Police have killed at least 40 people since violent confrontations began on Tuesday, following largely peaceful protests on Monday, medical officials said, asking not to be identified for fear of retaliation from government officials.

Government figures place the number of dead at 13 civilians and one police officer, with 54 officers and 28 civilians injured.

"We know that there are some problems in some parts of the city today, but I don't have exact figures on casualties so far," Information Minister Berhan Hailu said on Thursday.

Election protests
The violence erupted over protests of May 15 elections that gave Prime Minister Meles Zenawi's Ethiopian Peoples Revolutionary Democratic Front control of nearly two-thirds of Parliament.

Opposition parties say the vote and counting were marred by fraud, intimidation and violence, and accuse the ruling party of rigging the elections.

The election had been seen as a test of Meles's commitment to reform. Meles has been lauded in the West as a new kind of African leader, appointed to British Prime Minister Tony Blair to his Commission for Africa to help draft a blueprint for ending poverty and building democracy. But at home his government has little tolerance for dissent and has been accused of severe human rights abuses.

Thursday's victims were shot at Old Airport, a wealthy neighbourhood where many foreign expatriates live, according to doctors at the Black Lion and Zewditu hospitals.

The wounded included a seven-year-old girl who lost an eye after police hit her with a baton. An 11-year-old boy, Yarad Wubetu, was shot in the stomach when he came out of his home to watch police chasing a group of young men, said his mother, Lomi Bayia, a 33-year-old seamstress.

"I had told him not to leave the house, but he is a small boy and he was interested because of all the noise," she said.

Call for restraint
Britain's Minister for Africa, Lord Triesman, called for restraint on Thursday from both sides and for an urgent, independent investigation into this week's violence. The Foreign and Commonwealth Office advised Britons against non-essential travel to Ethiopia, saying further violence in Addis Ababa and other towns cannot be ruled out.

The British ambassador in Addis Ababa called on the Ethiopian foreign minister and expressed serious concern over the arrest of opposition leaders and some civil society representatives, and urged that all those not to be charged should be released immediately.

The protests began peacefully on Monday, when taxi drivers hooted their horns to show support for the opposition. Thirty of the drivers were arrested, which may have sparked protests on Tuesday that deteriorated into deadly clashes.

Amid the protests, a New York-based media watchdog said authorities have threatened to arrest journalists and made statements that could endanger independent reporters in the capital. The government also appears to be using state media to smear foreign and independent media. -- Sapa-AP