English/NatXFAThousands of Kenyans, including legislators and human rights activists, paid their respects on Wednesday to an outspoken American priest who was found shot dead last week.Speakers at the funeral mass in Nairobi proclaimed the Reverend John Kaiser a martyr and a beacon for the oppressed and suffering.Ahead of the mass, members of the Kenya Human Rights Network and students demonstrated outside the Holy Family Basilica Cathedral, chanting and singing freedom songs.Many of the demonstrators carried banners saying, "Killers of Father Kaiser are assassins of truth and liberty."The body of 67-year-old John Kaiser, a vocal critic of Kenya's human rights record, was found early last Thursday along a highway near Naivasha, 80 kilometers (50 miles) northwest of Nairobi. He had been shot in the back of the head.Human rights activists and opposition politicians called his death a political killing.Kaiser, a native of Minnesota, had worked in Kenya for 36 years.Carolita Mahoney, Kaiser's sister arrived from the U-S on Monday to attend her brother's funeral.She said his death was a dreadful tragedy but her brother's martyrdom would far outweigh his murder.About three thousand mourners joined Mahoney at the packed cathedral for the service which lasted more than three hours.Archbishop Giovanni Tonucci, the Pope's representative in Kenya, said Kaiser was the third missionary to be killed in the East African nation in the last four years.SOUNDBITE: (English)"This is a simple man, a man of God and he has been murdered for what he stood for so it is certainly a political murder."SUPER CAPTION: James Orengo, Ford Kenya PartyAfter the mass, the coffin was taken to the small town of Nyangusu, 250 kilometers (155 miles) northwest of Nairobi, in Kisii district for an all night vigil.The United States has dispatched three F-B-I agents to work alongside Kenyan police. A fourth agent attached to the U-S embassy is also in the investigation team.You can license this story through AP Archive: http://www.aparchive.com/metadata/you... Find out more about AP Archive: http://www.aparchive.com/HowWeWork