Ethnic Groups Kenya

The attackers came at night, brandishing clubs, machetes and bows. Peter Wachira heard them coming and tried to flee his farm, but not before he was shot in the thigh with an arrow and slashed in the head with a machete. Wachira, a 30-year-old ethnic Kikuyu, blamed the assault on members of a rival group, the Kalenjins. "I heard them speak the language. . . .

When Mary Magdelena Akinyi's husband died, the custom of her Luo ethnic group dictated that she be "inherited" by one of her already married brothers-in-law. Akinyi refused. The 24-year-old former nursery school teacher felt the centuries-old cultural practice robs women of their dignity and independence. But what ultimately led her to reject the tradition was fear of death--either her own or that of relatives--from AIDS.

When Mary Magdelena Akinyi's husband died, the custom of her Luo ethnic group dictated that she be "inherited" by one of her already married brothers-in-law. Akinyi refused. The 24-year-old former nursery school teacher felt the centuries-old cultural practice robs women of their dignity and independence. But what ultimately led her to reject the tradition was fear of death--either her own or that of relatives--from AIDS.

The attackers came at night, brandishing clubs, machetes and bows. Peter Wachira heard them coming and tried to flee his farm, but not before he was shot in the thigh with an arrow and slashed in the head with a machete. Wachira, a 30-year-old ethnic Kikuyu, blamed the assault on members of a rival group, the Kalenjins. "I heard them speak the language. . . .

From the genocidal "ethnic cleansing" of the former Yugoslav federation to the brutal conflicts in the former Soviet Union and many countries of Africa and Asia, violence has taken root between people who share the same terrain but differ in ethnicity, race, language or religion. A U.N. report in May estimated that "internal conflicts afflict some 60 countries" in the developing world alone.