Somalia postpones long-awaited peace conference

[Eugene]

Source: Reuters

Somalia postpones long-awaited peace conference

By Guled Mohamed
54 minutes ago

MOGADISHU (Reuters) - Organizers of a national reconciliation
conference in Somalia due to start on Thursday have postponed it
for one month in another blow to peace efforts in the chaotic Horn
of Africa nation.

"The National Reconciliation Committee has decided to postpone the
conference due to unforeseen circumstances," committee chairman
Ali Mahdi Mohamed told reporters.

It was the second postponement of the national reconciliation meeting
-- originally scheduled for April -- that was intended to bring together
in Mogadishu hundreds of delegates from feuding clans and factions
across Somalia.

-snip-

Foreign diplomats had widely expected the postponement, even though
they are pinning their hopes on the conference as the best way to try
to secure lasting peace in Somalia, which has been in anarchy since
the ousting of a dictator in 1991.

-snip-

Read more: http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20070613/wl_nm/somalia_conflict_dc