Somali peace talks suffer setback

The ongoing Somali peace and reconciliation talks in Nairobi suffered a major setback on Tuesday following the withdrawal of two major clans.

The leaders from the Southern Somalia National Movement (SSNM) who are from the Dir clan and traditional leaders from Hawiye clan accused the organizers of the conference, the Inter Governmental Authority on Development Facilitation Committee (IFC) of interference in the apportionment of clan-based parliamentary seats.

The latest move by the two clans is a major setback to the current timetable to restore normalcy to the strife-torn Horn of African nation which has been without a central government for the last 13 years.

"The Somali ownership of the conference has been undermined by IFC as evident in their total denial of the Dir clan to determine their representatives in final power sharing phase of the conference," Abdullahi Ismail, the SSNM chairman told reporters in Nairobi.

However, Kenyan special envoy for peace in Somalia Bethwel Kiplagat said that the IFC were currently removing all bottlenecks in the distribution of seats among sub-clans and addressing the selection of MPs in a bid to bring the talks to a successful completion.

He said that the selection of MPs will be followed by the election of a president, which will lead to the formation of a government in Somalia.

The Kenyan-mediated peace conference, which has been backed by the United Nations and regional governments, is the latest of 15 attempts to reunite Somalia under a central government since the last one collapsed amid civil war in 1991.

The 14 previous conferences tried to restore peace by securing a deal among the warlords and the failure has been blamed on machinations by one or other of Somalia's neighbors who intervened to support a dissident faction.