The Somali government will send a delegation to Khartoum for peace talks with the powerful Islamic courts, officials said on Sunday, a day after ruling out talks without international guarantees that would supervise the implementation of deals agreed.
“The government will attend the peace talks negotiated by the Arab League and government of Sudan. A 15-member delegation consisting of the council of ministers and parliamentarians will fly to Khartoum on August 2,” parliament speaker Sharif Hassan Sheikh Aden told AFP.
He said the decision was reached after hours of negotiations between President Abdullahi Yusuf Ahmed and Prime Minister Ali Mohamed Gedi.
“Negotiations and dialogue is the only solution to the Somali problem,” he said.
“The international community wants to see a peaceful Somalia, not a nation engaged in endless battles. I am urgung the Islamic courts also to support peace efforts by the Arab League,” Aden said.
On Saturday, Deputy Information Minister Salad Ali Jeeley ruled out talks with the Islamists, who control swathes of southern Somalia, including the capital Mogadishu, until there were international guarantors to supervise the implementation of agreements reached.
Last month, the government and the Islamists reached a mutual recognition pact that also called for a cessation of hostilities.
Both sides were set to resume talks at an as yet unannounced date, but recent tension between them has undermined prospects of holding those negotiations.
Tension has heightened between them after Ethiopian troops moved into Somalia to protect the country’s toothless government after it accused the Islamists of plotting an attack against it.
But the government based in in Baidoa, a provincial outpost 250 kilometres (155 miles) northwest of the capital, again denied the claims.
“News reports are full of rumours and speculations that there were Ethiopian troops in Baidoa. This is a fabricated lie. No Ethiopian troops crossed the border and soon we will invite the international media to see that the reports about Ethiopian incursion are false,” Information Minister Mohamed Adbi Hayir told the press.
Although both the Somali government and Addis Ababa deny the presence of Ethiopian troops in Baidoa, also the seat of government, local residents have spotted Ethiopian troops and military vehicles there.
The Horn of Africa nation has been wracked by rounds of bloody clashes since the 1991 ouster of former dictator Siad Barre that plunged the country into anarchy.
