ALHAYAT - Issue N0. 13769 - Wednesday, 22 November 2000
 (This is an Arabic newspaper publsihed in London)

UGANDA WILL NOT ATTEND AND ETHIOPIA AND KENYA HAVE RESERVATIONS ABOUT THE PARTICIPATION OF SOMALIA

KHARTOUM: CONTACTS TO RESCUE THE "IGAD" SUMMIT FROM FAILURE

Khartoum - Al-Nur Ahmed Al-Nur

Khartoum has intensified its contacts with Addis Ababa, Djibouti and Nairobi to rescue the 8th Summit of the Heads of IGAD countries of Africa which is scheduled to be held tomorrow after it is threatened to fail because of the complications of the Somali issue which might have stopped the leaders of Ethiopia, Kenya and Djibouti from participating in the summit which Sudan is hosting for the first time.

Up to now it has been confirmed that the Ugandan president Yweri Musaveni would not attend the summit. It was not possible to confirm whether the Kenyan president Daniel arap Moi would attend despite the efforts of the Sudanese leadership to convince him

The Ethiopian government's participation in the summit is conditioned on the recognition of the Somali president Abdulqasim Salad Hassan of the Somali opposition and his co-operation with them, an issue which was rejected by Djibouti as an interference in the internal Somali affairs and an affront to the position of the president of Somalia who was elected by Somali forces at Arta in Djibouti, and threatened to boycott the summit.

Sudanese diplomatic sources told Al-Hayat that Nairobi has reservations against the participation of the Somali president in the summit because the membership of his country in the organisation is frozen in a previous summit and that it is not possible to reinstate its membership except by a new decision of the Heads of State. Therefore, the Somali president has no right to attend the summit in Khartoum.

The Sudanese government has tried to convince Moi and sent to Nairobi its Foreign Minister Mustafa Osman and Cabinet Minister General Abdurahman Sirr-ul Khatam and proposed that the Somali president is invited but his participation is made subject to the agreement of the summit to unfreeze the membership of his country.

The same sources have confirmed that the Sudanese Foreign Minister was in continuous touch with yesterday with Addis Ababa and Djibouti in an attempt to surmount the crisis which was triggered by the Somali case and to secure the participation of the presidents of these countries in the summit. But no information has come out of the results of these contacts, which Khartoum is keeping quite about.

Mustafa Osman told reporters yesterday that Somalia will not participate in the summit, clarifying that his visit to Ethiopia and Kenya was about the protestation of Nairobi and Addis Ababa of the Somali participation in the summit. He said that it was agreed to discuss the new Somali situation in the agenda of the summit. He said that the participation of Somalia would depend on the decision that the summit takes, explaining that up to yesterday he has not received any assurance on the attendance of the Kenyan president.

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Thursday, November 23 1:51 AM
SGT
Participants arrive for African regional summit
KHARTOUM, Nov 22 (AFP) -

Participants began arriving here Wednesday for the summit meeting of the regional Inter-Governmental Authority on Development which is expected to be attended by Somalia for the first time since 1991.

Eritrea's President Issaias Afeworki and Ethiopian Prime Minister Meles Zenawi, whose neighbouring states have been observing a ceasefire since June, after two years of war, were among the first to land in the Sudanese capital.

Together with Djibouti's President Ismael Omar Guelleh they were scheduled to meet late Wednesday with host Omar al-Beshir to discuss in particular the situation in Somalia.

If they follow the advice of a foreign ministers' meeting which ended late Wednesday they will invite Somalia's transitional President Abdulkassim Salat Hassan to fill Mogadishu's seat at Thursday's summit.

Salat was appointed at the end of August by a national assembly set up during a reconciliation conference sponsored by Djibouti and backed by IGAD, but he is not recognised either by main faction leaders or the breakaway areas of Somaliland and Puntland.

For most of the 1990s, Somalia had no president or central government. Instead, a variety of warlords have carved up the country into personal fiefdoms, frequently battling with rivals.

Accordingly, the new government is keen to solicit as much support as possible from IGAD and its member states.

The ministers approved a draft resolution hailing the participation of Salat's transitional government in IGAD activities but recommending a continual assessment of Somalia's progress towards peace and national
reconciliation.

Absent from the summit will be Daniel Arap Moi and Yoweri Museveni, the presidents of Kenya and Uganda, both IGAD member states.

Aside from Somalia, the meeting is also expected to focus on the civil war in Sudan, where IGAD is mediating between the Khartoum government and rebels in the south.

Egyptian Foreign Minister Amr Mussa is an observer at the summit and will be joined later by Libya's African Unity Minister Ali Triki for talks with IGAD counterparts on Sudan.

Unlike IGAD's plan, Cairo and Tripoli are working towards bringing peace between Khartoum and all rebel groups, north as well as south.

Mussa said on arrival his government "seriously and persistently works for dialogue and historic reconciliation between the Sudanese parties."

He said, however, the joint Egyptian-Libyan initiative "cannot achieve its goals overnight" and it might take some time for reaching peace and reconciliation in Sudan.

Mussa said the current IGAD meetings offer "a good opportunity" for coordination between the joint initiative and the one sponsored by IGAD.

"The meetings also offer an opportunity for reviewing common Arab and African issues," he added.

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