Demonstrators are detained in a police during clashes in the Musaga district of Bujumbura, Burundi, on May 4, 2015.Jerome Delay/The Associated Press
Wincing with pain from the bullet wound in his leg, Tony-Fiston Igirukwishaka vowed to return to the street protests, even if the police keep shooting.
"Nothing will stop us," the 20-year-old Burundian student said on his hospital gurney. "We have to do this. I'll go back as soon as I've recovered. We are fighting against domination."
Burundi's police, enforcing a ban on protests, intensified their use of live ammunition against demonstrators on Monday, leaving a rising toll of dead and injured. It's the second week of protests against President Pierre Nkurunziza, who is seeking a third term as President despite widespread accusations that he is violating the constitution.
The Burundian protests are a closely watched barometer of Africa's burgeoning democracy movement. While incumbent presidents have been toppled recently from Nigeria to Burkina Faso, others are grimly seeking ways to hang on to power, in defiance of normal rules against third terms.
The conflict in Burundi has added significance because it could spill across borders to the larger volatile region in the centre of the continent, ravaged by wars and genocide in the past. About 300,000 people were killed in Burundi's civil war from 1993 to 2005. Over the past month alone, more than 30,000 Burundians have fled to Rwanda, Tanzania and the Democratic Republic of Congo for fear of violence, according to the United Nations.
Burundi's Red Cross said at least three people were killed and 46 injured in the clashes on Monday, the bloodiest day since the protests began. Other reports said four were killed, bringing the death toll to 13 so far.
"I'm ready to die," said Saidi Sibomona, a protester who was shot in the shoulder on Monday. "I want the police to let us march freely. It's our right to demonstrate."
Didier Mufarigi, shot in the hip, said the rising death toll shows that the number of protesters is growing. "I don't think the police will stop shooting, because they know that if they stop, we will win," he said from hospital, where he was groaning with agony from a bullet wound on Monday.
The victims were from several different districts of the capital, Bujumbura, suggesting that the police decision to shoot at protesters was not an isolated decision. One injured man said the police had tried to use tear gas against them, but the protesters had learned how to use water to neutralize the gas.
The protesters are determined to break through police lines to reach the centre of the town, where government ministries are located, but most have been blocked so far.
A grenade explosion injured 15 police officers on Monday, police said. They blamed protesters, although the protest leaders have denied responsibility.
The Burundian government has accused the protesters of being "terrorists" and "insurrectionists." But many experts, inside Burundi and outside, have warned that the President's third-term bid is a violation of the constitution and the Arusha agreement that ended the civil war.
U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry said the protests in Burundi "should be listened to" because they are a result of a presidential bid that "flies directly in the face" of the constitution. "We are deeply concerned about President Nkurunziza's decision," he told a press conference in Nairobi on Monday.
Adding to the crisis, the vice-president of Burundi's constitutional court has fled the country, just as the court was about to rule on the legality of the third-term issue. Most of its members are government appointees, and it was widely expected to favour the President.
"In my soul and conscience I decided not to put my signature to a ruling … which is clearly not lawful that would be imposed from the outside," Judge Sylvère Nimpagaritse told Agence France-Presse on Monday after fleeing.