Bangkok- A showdown in Bangkok between police and protestors around Parliament claimed two dead and 437 injured, public health officials said Wednesday.

On Tuesday, in the worst street fighting witnessed in the capital since the May event of 1992, riot police confronted thousands of followers of the People's Alliance for Democracy (PAD) which had laid siege to Parliament in an effort to block Thailand's newly appointed government from reading its policy statement, thus legitimizing its rule.

Police largely limited themselves to using tear gas against the PAD, but by firing the cannisters directly into the crowds they caused many serious injuries, including the loss of limbs for four protestors.

One female protestor died en route to hospital from asphyxiation and a man was killed when a jeep exploded near Parliament under still mysterious circumstances.

The emergency centre of the Public Health Ministry reported that 437 people were injured in Tuesday's street fighting, with 73 still hospitalized as of Wednesday.

The injured were not exclusively protestors.

At least eight policemen were badly injured, two by gun fire and a third who was run over repeatedly by a pickup truck.

Bangkok has not witnessed such bloodshed since the army cracked down on a similar protest in May 1992, against the government of former Prime Minster General Suchinda Kraprayoon.

That bloodbath left over 100 dead or missing. Suchinda was forced to resign.

The 1992 protests were led by Major-General Chamlong Srimuang, a founder of the PAD, a loose coalition of groups opposed to the return to power of former premier Thaksin Shinawatra and his populist policies that arguably altered Thailand's traditional political scene of checks and balances between elected politicians and appointed bureaucrats.

The PAD, which was born in late 2005 as a mass movement to oust Thaksin, Thailand's prime minister between 2001 to 2006, has been staging street protests against the administrations led by the People Power Party (PPP), which won the December 23, 2007 election, since May this year.

They accuse the PPP, which has close ties to Thaksin, of trying to reinstate Thaksin who is currently living in self-exile in London with his family.

Thousands of PAD followers stormed and occupied Government House, the seat of the administration, on August 26, and have occupied it since.

The PAD took to the streets again on Monday to lay siege to Parliament, in a bid to prevent the newly appointed cabinet of Somchai Wongsawat, Thaksin's brother-in-law, from launching his administration on Tuesday.

The protest followed the arrest on Sunday of Chamlong on treason charges.

Most PAD followers had returned to Government House, their headquarters for the past month and a half, on Wednesday.

"We've heard a lot of rumours on the possible attack and we think it is more important to station here (inside Government House)," said Suriyasai Katasila, a PAD leader.

"We can march to Parliament any time but we do have to stay here because here is the symbol of government," he told PAD followers in a speech at Government House Tuesday night, according to Thai media reports. (dpa)