FOUR people have been killed and about 30 injured as fuel protests continue to grip Kenya.

At least 348 people were arrested on Monday, according to Interior Minister Kipchumba Murkomen, as people gathered in the streets to show support for a nationwide public transport strike.

“We lost four Kenyans in today’s violence, which also saw more than 30 people injured,” Mr Murkomen told a televised press conference.

The streets of the capital Nairobi and many other cities were deserted.

In Nairobi, police fired tear gas at protesters who had thrown stones and blocked major roads with burning tyres, according to eyewitnesses.

Transport unions have demanded that the government reverse a recent fuel price increase. Kenya raised retail fuel prices by as much as 23.5 per cent last week, following a 24.2 per cent increase last month.

Higher fuel costs are now pushing up the prices of food and other basic goods, straining the resources of many people who were already struggling.

The Ministry of Energy and Petroleum defended the fuel price rise, saying that the decision had been taken against a backdrop of sustained volatility in global oil markets due to the Iran war.

The Communist Party Marxist — Kenya condemned the killings, including of one of its members, and said in a statement that the current crisis was “the inevitable outcome of a neocolonial capitalist system subordinated to imperialism, foreign finance capital and the dictatorship of profit over human life.

“The same system that imposes IMF-dictated austerity, taxation, privatisation and debt dependency is the same system now forcing the masses to carry the burden of rising global fuel prices and imperialist wars abroad.

“The more the regime murders and represses, the more it exposes its own bankruptcy before the masses.”