The future of democracy across the entire African continent hangs on Kenya's ability to halt the horrific violence that has swept across the country after the disputed presidential elections last December, Kenyan church leaders said on Friday.

They warned, however, that deep-rooted ethnic divisions would take a long time to heal and require more than unanimity on the political level.

"Kenya is a test case of whether Africa moves forward in the democratic process," Agnes Abuom, a Kenyan historian and former political detainee from the country's Anglican Church told a news conference in Geneva.

Ms Abuom was in the Swiss city for a 10-day meeting of the World Council of Churches central committee, the highest governing body of the ecumenical council, which began last Wednesday.

More than 1,000 have been killed in ethnic violence in Kenya, formerly a bulwark of democracy and economic stability. Opposition leader, Raila Odinga, a Luo, says the 27 December elections were stolen by President Mwai Kibaki to secure his re-election.

Ethnic violence has boiled over in the western regions in particular, where around 20,000 Kikuyus -Kibaki's tribe - have been driven out by the majority Luos in the past few weeks. Others have been butchered to death by machete-wielding mobs.

Ms Abuom, a former WCC president and campaigner for social justice, added, "What has happened was inevitable."

South African Methodist Bishop Mvume Dandala, head of the Nairobi-based All African Council of Churches, was also in Geneva last week.

"To allow democracy to collapse in Kenya would be to allow it to collapse around the continent," he warned.

Christianity is the dominant religion in Kenya, and the opinions of church leaders are taken seriously by the country's political leaders.

Earlier in the central committee meeting, WCC General Secretary Rev Dr Samuel Kobia told representatives of the body's 348 members that Kenya's breakdown "severely tests the notion of elections as a panacea for democracy and good governance".

He pointed to the reluctance of many government leaders - and bishops - on the African continent to give up power.

"One of the most difficult situations in Africa is change of government. This often produces violence. We don't have the culture or tradition for the change of one regime to another," said Dr Kobia.