The leader of Kenya's opposition said he is willing to share power with a government he says was elected fraudulently, but called for the continuation of rallies and protests.
Raila Odinga has rejected President Mwai Kibaki's offer of a national unity government, saying he was elected fraudulently and therefore the offer has no legitimacy.
On Sunday, he told reporters he was ready to talk about sharing power, but only through mediated negotiations guaranteed by the international community.
Odinga said he plans to proceed with a major protest on Tuesday in defiance of a government ban -- suggesting that tension that has followed the Dec. 27 election may not yet be over.
"If there is any bloodshed during these rallies it will be the government's responsibility," Odinga told reporters.
But despite the comments, a relative calm seemed to have descended on Kenya -- an answer to the prayers of many Kenyans after ethnically motivated violence that has left 300 people dead.
Kibaki was re-elected by a narrow margin, in an election that international election observers said was deeply flawed.
The political divide has split Kibaki and Odinga's supporters largely along ethnic lines. Kibaki's backers -- mostly members of the Kikuyu people -- are pitted against Kenya's other tribes.
Odinga said "there cannot be peace without justice."
"We want a mediator," he said. "We want a properly negotiated settlement, not a coalition government."
The government will have trouble ruling without the opposition's support. Odinga's party holds 95 of the 210 seats in the legislature.
Kibaki and Odinga both met independently with Jendayi Frazer, a top U.S. representative in the region who has been attempting to find a solution to the dispute.
Ghana's President John Kufuor, current chairman of the African Union, is expected to arrive in Nairobi by Tuesday to meet with both leaders.
About 250,000 Kenyans are reported to have fled or been forced from their homes as a result of the fighting in a country that has often been held up as a model of peace and democracy in Africa.
Ralph Bromley, president of the relief agency Hope for the Nations, a group that provides assistance to children at risk and has six members working in Kenya, said tension has eased dramatically.
"There's a sense of relative calm that has just hit within the last day or two. From our place there are no more gunshots, no more fires at night, so an amazing turnaround in one of the most violent areas of Kenya," Bromley, a Canadian, told Â鶹´«Ã½net.
He was speaking by phone from Kitale, Kenya, near the border of Uganda, where the group has been stranded for several days. As of Sunday, Bromley said, there was a heavy troop presence as soldiers helped escort displaced Kenyans searching for refuge. He said debris from the fighting and rioting is being cleared from previously-blocked roads, and "a blanket of peace" seemed to have descended on the region.
In Nairobi, the capital, roughly 100,000 people are in dire need of food and assistance, according to reports from the UN World Food Program's logistics officer Lemma Jembere.
On Sunday, the UN sent 20 trucks loaded with essential food into some of the neediest areas in Nairobi and Eldoret city, in the central Rift Valley where Odinga has a strong grip on the vote.
With files from The Associated Press
