TRIPOLI (AFP)--Visiting Somali President Abdullahi Yusuf Ahmed said Tuesday he was seeking to move the venue of Somali reconciliation talks from Djibouti to Libya, the official Jana news agency reported.
"I informed the brother guide (Libyan leader Moammar Gadhafi) about developments in Somalia and turned over to him the file on Somali reconciliation, asking him to take personal charge of it," the visiting Yusuf was quoted as saying.
He said he had asked Gadhafi to "ask Djibouti President Omar Guelleh to change the venue of the negotiations" to Libya, on the grounds that Libya has "more resources" to host the talks.
Somalia has lacked an effective government since the 1991 ouster of strongman Mohamed Siad Barre touched off a bloody power struggle that has defied numerous attempts to restore stability.
An agreement was reached at U.N.-sponsored talks in Djibouti last month between the transitional federal government and the main opposition alliance providing for a cessation of hostilities and a gradual pullback of Ethiopian troops currently in Somalia.
However, hardline Islamists have rejected the deal and fighting has continued to rage.
Ethiopian troops came to the rescue in late 2006 of the embattled transitional government which had been confined to the backwater of Baidoa and ousted the Islamic Courts Union from Mogadishu.
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(END) Dow Jones Newswires
November 18, 2008 11:39 ET (16:39 GMT)

Publié le 18 novembre 2008 Copyright © 2008 Dowjones