AKIPRESS.COM - Ugandan police fought running battles with supporters of opposition leader Kizza Besigye in Kampala, in the worst outbreak of violence yet during campaigning for Thursday's presidential election.

Several people were wounded on Monday as police fired bullets and tear gas while opposition supporters hurled rocks and erected street barricades in the capital's Wandegeya suburb, witnesses said. Hours earlier, police briefly detained Besigye, reports Reuters.

"I have seen people shot although we're yet to know how many exactly," said Ingrid Turinawe, a senior official from Besigye's Forum for Democratic Change (FDC) party.

"Many people (were) on the road bleeding, the situation is still very tense."

Besigye is expected to be one of two main election challengers to veteran leader Yoweri Museveni, who will attempt to extend a 30-year hold on power that his opponents say has been increasingly underpinned by state intimidation and rampant corruption.

Several opposition supporters were arrested on Monday, said a Reuters photographer who also saw one person passed out in a large pool of blood, either dead or critically wounded.

Witnesses said streets were calmer in the evening but the violence has fuelled tensions before the Feb. 18 election, which Besigye and six other candidates will contest alongside Museveni.