'My message to the government and people of Kenya is to stop this violence and to solve all these issues ... through dialogue in a peaceful manner,' Mr Ban said to journalists in Nairobi, where he added his weight to mediation efforts led by his predecessor Kofi Annan.

'You are taking a very important historical responsibility at this critically important junction,' the UN secretary general said, sitting alongside Mr Annan and representatives of negotiating teams for President Mwai Kibaki and opposition leader Raila Odinga.

Ban arrived in Kenya Friday in the wake of turmoil sparked by disputed presidential elections on Dec 27 that sparked weeks of unrest in which almost 1,000 have died and some 300,000 have been displaced.

But as mediation efforts continued, so did the unrest, as police shot dead one man in the volatile western opposition stronghold of Kisumu as they dispersed a group of demonstrators.

'The man was shot because he was in group that wanted to attack Kondele district police station,' a police commander said.

'We were only expressing our emotions peacefully when police opened fire and killed one of us,' said Simon Okelo, a protestor.

In Nairobi, Mr Ban called on both sides to work to stem the violence, after more than a month of post-poll protests now mixed with latent economic, land and ethnic disputes.

'What I'd like to ask you is to look beyond these individual interests, look beyond the party lines,' he said.

The crisis has shattered the image and economy of the formerly stable east African nation that is a refuge for many displaced by neighbouring conflicts.

Mr Annan earlier resumed talks between three representatives each of Mr Kibaki and Mr Odinga after postponing them the previous day when an opposition lawmaker was shot dead in the western town of Eldoret.

The killing - the second slaying of an opposition lawmaker in two days - set off further clashes in the volatile western region.

Mr Odinga's party said the killing of opposition MP David Kimutai Too in Eldoret on Thursday had been a political assassination, although police described it as a crime of passion.

Mr Odinga visited Too's body on Friday, after it was flown to Nairobi, and accused the government of involvement in his killing and that of opposition MP Melitus Mugabe Were in Nairobi early Tuesday.

'Our charge is that the government has killed them: let them disprove this and accept this offer of an independent inquiry,' he said.

Mr Odinga said on Thursday that the two MP killings were 'part of a plot' to reduce his Orange Democratic Movement's (ODM) majority in parliament.

The ODM secured 99 seats in the legislative elections that coincided with the presidential poll, making it the largest single party but short of an overall majority. Kibaki's Party of National Unity (PNU) won 43 seats.

Mr Ban met with Mr Odinga in Nairobi on Friday, after meeting with Mr Kibaki on the sidelines of an African Union summit in Ethiopia the previous day. -- AFP