Retreat must not be parallel conference, says SRRC

Members of the Somali Reconciliation and Restoration Council (SRRC) attending peace talks in Kenya have called on the conference organisers not to allow a proposed retreat for Somali leaders to become a parallel conference. Col Hasan Muhammad Nur Shatigadud, the current SRRC chairman, told IRIN that the Council welcomed any effort to move the peace process forward. "However we will not accept another conference," he said. "There should be a time limit to it [the retreat], and the discussions should not be used as a means of revisiting issues already settled." In a letter to the conference chairman Ambassador Bethuel Kiplagat of Kenya, on behalf of the SRRC, Shatigadud said participation in the retreat should be limited "to the 24 leaders who signed the Cessation of Hostilities Agreement [in Eldoret in October 2002], plus [Transitional National Government President] Abdiqassim Salad Hassan". The 10-day retreat is due to begin in Mombasa on 9 December and is expected to bring together most of the Somali leaders "to give them a chance to iron out outstanding issues and chart the way forward", said James Kiboi of the Inter-Governmental Authority on Development (IGAD) technical committee, which is steering the talks. He added that consultations on whom to invite were still in progress, and a final list would be out "shortly". Shatigadud said the SRRC would welcome those leaders who had left the talks for one reason or another, "but there should not be an expansion of the leaders' committee". Somali sources told IRIN that a number of leaders who were not signatories to the Cessation of Hostilities were expected to be invited to the retreat. "Inviting such leaders will dilute the SRRC's influence, that is why they [SRRC] are opposed to it," said one of the sources. Among the leaders absent from the talks are Abdiqassim Salad Hassan; prominent Mogadishu-based faction leaders Muse Sudi Yalahow and Usman Hasan Ato; the leader of the Kismayo-based Juba Valley Alliance, Col Barre Adan Hirale; and Muhammad Ibrahim Habsade of the Rahanweyn Resistance Army. Shatigadud said the SRRC would like to see the full programme of the agenda and the list of participants before 9 December. "Failure to do so would be a matter of great concern, and this Council will not be held responsible for the inevitable consequences of such a failure," he warned. "I hope we will be able to speed up the [peace] process and come up with an agreement that will satisfy the people of Somalia." The IGAD-sponsored talks began in October 2002 in the western Kenyan town of Eldoret, but were moved to the capital, Nairobi, in February this year. They have been dogged by wrangles over issues such as an interim charter (draft constitution), the number of participants in the talks and the selection of future parliamentarians.