A far-left activist suspected of killing a right-wing protester in Portland was shot dead by police in Washington state as they tried to arrest him, local law officials said.

The man, identified in US media reports as Michael Forest Reinoehl, was killed as he ran from four officers on Thursday evening, a spokesman for the Thurston county sheriff’s office, southwest of Seattle, told AFP on Friday.

A regional task force was watching the apartment of a “homicide suspect”, who left the building and approached a vehicle “as officers attempted to apprehend him”, Lieutenant Ray Brady said.