KHARTOUM (Reuters) - Somalia's interim government and a powerful rival Islamist administration are to agree on a declaration of principles for talks to resolve an impasse over control in the anarchic nation, a spokesman said on Monday.
The fragile interim government and representatives of a Mogadishu-based Islamist movement met in the Sudanese capital Khartoum for a third day of Arab League-mediated talks aimed at reaching a power-sharing agreement.
"We are going to sign tonight what will be a time frame for coming back together for further talks," said Awad Ahmed Ashareh, a parliamentarian and member of the government delegation.
"We will come back on October 30 to resume talks on power-sharing and other issues," he added without giving further details.
Earlier he described it as a framework for further negotiations.
The head of the Islamic courts delegation confirmed he expected to reach agreement on principles on Monday evening.
"The two items left on the last dialogue agenda were security and power-sharing and the political aspects," Ibrahim Hassan Addow told Reuters.
"So our discussion was mainly on the first item of security," he added.
The two sides met in Khartoum in June for their first direct talks where they agreed to recognise each other and on a cease-fire.
The Islamists, who rose to power by taking Mogadishu and its environs in June from the warlords who had ruled it since the ouster of dictator Mohamed Siad Barre in 1991, have threatened the government's narrow authority.
CABINET POSTS?
"We want to accommodate the Islamic groups into the form of a government," said Ashareh, adding they would offer them cabinet posts if needed. He said he was speaking on behalf of the government delegation in Khartoum.
The Islamists, who are militarily superior, want to impose strict Islamic sharia law throughout the nation of 10 million, which puts them at odds with the secular government.
The Khartoum talks, now in their second round, came as members of the regional peace body IGAD -- which led the peace process that created the interim Somali government in late 2004 -- met ahead of a top-level summit due in Nairobi on Tuesday.
Most heads of state and government from the seven members of IGAD -- Somalia, Sudan, Uganda, Eritrea, Ethiopia, Kenya and Djibouti -- were due to discuss speeding up the deployment of foreign peacekeepers to Somalia.
That move is backed by the Somali government and its top ally and protector, Ethiopia, with support from Kenya and Uganda, diplomats say.
The Islamists, who have imposed a semblance of order in the turf they control through well-disciplined militias, are vehemently opposed.
Islamist leader Sheikh Sharif Ahmed, who met Kenyan and U.N. officials over the weekend, on Monday returned to Mogadishu and blamed Ethiopia for pushing the peacekeeping plan.
"Kenya and the United Nations seem to understand there is no need for the deployment of troops. Kenya has put a lot of effort to bring peace in Somalia. We have no enmity with them," he told reporters.
The Islamists have started issuing visas and opened Mogadishu's international airport and its main seaport, where a boat from the U.N.'s World Food Programme docked on Sunday.
(c) Reuters 2006
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