Negotiations sponsored by the United Nations and aimed at bringing the Somali government and its main political foes into direct dialogue were due to resume on Saturday in Djibouti. The first round of discussions ended on May 16 and although the rivals did not engage in direct talks, the move was seen as a breakthrough in efforts to end conflict.
The Somali government and the main political opposition issued a rare joint statement on Friday calling on all sides to allow humanitarian access to the country’s war-torn population. The declaration was distributed by the office of United Nations envoy to Somalia Ahmedou Ould-Abdallah, who is mediating talks between the rivals.
Rare peace talks between Somalia’s interim government and opposition exiles have made a slow start in Djibouti, but a senior United Nations official said he was encouraged both sides had turned up. ”I am more than hopeful. The Somalis who I met today are committed to peace and reconciliation,” the UN envoy to Somalia told reporters in Djibouti late on Saturday.
Djibouti has accused Eritrea of violating its border in a worsening dispute over the Horn of Africa neighbours’ shared frontier. Djibouti says Eritrean soldiers entered its territory last month to dig trenches and build other defences. Eritrea has made no official comment.
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/ 15 November 2006
Leaders from Africa’s main trading bloc on Wednesday opened a summit in Djibouti to mull ways of forming a unified customs system for its 21-member states. Six presidents and a prime minister will explore possibilities of putting in place the commons unions for their markets by 2008.
The death toll from a ship capsize off the coast of the Red Sea state of Djibouti rose to at least 109 on Saturday. The toll climbed as the search went on for an unknown number of people still believed missing from Thursday’s accident, thought to be the worst disaster since the country won independence from France in 1975.
Djibouti’s President Ismail Omar Guelleh has ordered an investigation into the capsize of an apparently overloaded boat carrying religious pilgrims that killed at least 69 people, officials said on Friday. ”The exact circumstances of this tragedy must be known,” Guelleh said in a message of condolence released to the nation after Thursday’s accident.
For thousands of years, girls in the area that is now the tiny African country of Djibouti have been subjected to pharaonic circumcision. Djibouti’s health ministry estimates that 98% of all Djiboutian women are circumcised — the highest rate of any country in the world. Now activists are starting to refuse to follow this age-old tradition.