Warring Somalis take step toward stability

NAIROBI, Kenya – Somalia inaugurated a transitional Parliament on Sunday, taking an important first step toward forming a new government for the devastated country even as rivalries continue to plague a peace process still far from complete.

Newly chosen members of the 275-member assembly took their oaths in a ceremony attended by regional diplomats and U.N. officials, who promised to support the latest of more than a dozen attempts to restore order to the Horn of Africa nation.

Leaders of Somalia’s major clans have been meeting in Kenya since October 2002 in an attempt to end 13 years of fighting. They hope to establish the first effective central government since 1991, when warlords ousted dictator Mohamed Siad Barre before turning on one another, plunging the country into chaos.

As traditional Somali dancers and singers performed, former enemies took their oaths Sunday and celebrated the Parliament’s first official meeting.

“All of us, we are very happy. We are smelling the fruit of national unity,” said Abdulkadir Farah Guelid, a member of Parliament from the northeastern Punt-land region who was sworn in Sunday.

Participants in the peace process – funded by the European Union, the United Nations, Somalia’s neighbors and China – still must find a way to disarm the gunmen who control Somalia. But there was optimism Sunday that at last there is a forum to discuss the issue.

“Somalia today has, at last, a Parliament – a transitional Parliament but a fully legitimate Parliament since all of the Somali political and military and traditional forces have been involved in its formation,” said Italian ambassador Carlo Calia, the lead European Union diplomat at the talks.

An initial group of 196 members of Parliament were sworn in last week when the 275-member assembly originally was supposed to begin work. But the start was delayed because one of the country’s four major clans had not finished selecting its representatives.