NAIROBI: Somali government
officials and exiled Islamist opposition leaders are
to hold face-to-face peace talks in Djibouti, the
United Nations special envoy to the country said
Friday.
Ahmad Ould Abdallah said the UN-sponsored talks will
start on Saturday, sitting seven members of Prime
Minister Nur Hassan Hussein's transitional executive
at the same table as seven opposition figures,
mainly Islamists.
Somalia has been wracked by conflict since 1991,
with the capital Mogadishu plagued with political
and civil unrest, food riots, and attacks on Western
aid agencies.
The closed-doors discussions are expected to last up
to a week, with Ould Abdallah expressing optimism
after two failed peace conferences in 2007.
"You make peace in the first instance with your
enemies, not your friends," Ould Abdallah said in a
statement. The talks will be "without external
influence," he added.
Since taking office in November, Hussein has engaged
Somalia's Islamist opposition ¼ unlike his
predecessor Ali Mohamad Gedi.
The signs of hope for Somalia, where chaos has
defied more than a dozen peace initiatives since
president Mohammad Siad Barre was ousted in 1991,
come even as violence continues to rage across the
country.
The Islamic Courts Union, a militia which ousted
US-backed warlords from Mogadishu in 2006, briefly
ruled large parts of the country before being
defeated by Ethiopian forces last year.
Separately a US air raid on May 1st killed at least
12 people, including an alleged Al-Qaeda leader in
the country.
Ethiopian-backed Somali government troops are still
battling the movement's military wing and allied
clans in a guerrilla war which has left thousands
dead and displaced hundreds of thousands.
The UN Resident Humanitarian Coordinator to Somalia
Graham Farmer said so far at least 2.5 million
people - including a million displaced - are in need
of assistance, but violence has kept aid workers at
bay.
"Aware that the need for assistance is increasing,
we are committed to expanding our work to everywhere
we can. However, it is extremely unfortunate that at
this time of extreme need, our ability to respond
has been threatened by the deteriorating security
situation on the ground," Farmer said in a letter to
Somali officials.
"We need better security and safety to provide
vulnerable populations the assistance they need," he
said, pleading with the elders and all warring sides
to ensure aid reaches the needy.
Hard-liners from Somalia's dominant Hawiye clan and
the Islamist opposition had refused to take part in
previous reconciliation attempts, arguing that talks
should be held outside of Somalia and only after an
Ethiopian withdrawal. But the leader of the Alliance
for the Re-liberation of Somalia - an opposition
umbrella group based in Asmara, Eritrea, and
dominated by Islamists - said last month that his
group was willing to give Hussein a chance.
In fresh violence on Friday, two Somali policemen
were killed overnight when some 200 Islamist
insurgents raided a police station in Mogadishu.
"The insurgents stormed Waberi police station
chanting Allahu Akbar [God is Great] and I later saw
two dead policemen inside the premises," eyewitness
Muktar Abdullahi told AFP.
Source: AFP, May 10, 2008
