Somalian officials, fighters sign pact
Somalia’s largely powerless government and the Islamic fighters who control the country’s capital agreed Thursday to stop military action and recognize each other.
The nonaggression pact signed in Sudan is a move toward international acceptance for the militia, which the U.S. has accused of harboring al-Qaida and wanting to impose a Taliban-style theocracy throughout Somalia.
The militia has said, however, that it does not want to control Somalia’s government, and appeared to confirm that by recognizing the two-year-old interim administration backed by the United Nations.
The government based in Baidoa, 155 miles northwest of the capital, Mogadishu, agreed in exchange to recognize the religious justice system that the Islamic Courts Union militia has operated for years in much of southern Somalia.
The militia became the dominant military force in Somalia after it defeated secular warlords and seized control of Mogadishu and much of the south this month in battles that killed hundreds.
Petra, Jordan
Mideast leaders meet informally
Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert and Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas met informally in Jordan on Thursday, and aides said the leaders would hold official talks in coming weeks.
The two leaders attended a breakfast hosted by Jordan’s King Abdullah II as part of a two-day gathering of Nobel laureates and business and political leaders near the ruins of the ancient town of Petra.
Olmert and Abbas shook hands and smiled for the cameras but did not delve into substantive matters, officials said. It was their first meeting since Olmert’s centrist Kadima party won Israeli elections in March.
Olmert expressed his regret to Abbas over the deaths of more than a dozen Palestinian civilians killed in recent Israeli airstrikes in the Gaza Strip. “It is against our policy and I am very, very sorry,” Olmert said.
Budapest, Hungary
Bush relates Iraq to Hungary’s fight
Fifty years after Hungary’s revolt against communism, President Bush said Thursday that war-weary Iraqis can learn from this country’s long and bloody struggle against tyranny. “Liberty can be delayed but it cannot be denied,” the president said.
“Iraq’s young democracy still faces determined enemies, people who will use violence and brutality to stop the march of freedom,” Bush said in a speech concluding a quick trip to Hungary and Austria.
“Defeating these enemies will require sacrifice and continued patience, the kind of patience the good people of Hungary displayed after 1956.”
Under threatening rain clouds, Bush spoke to several hundred people at Gellert Hill with a panoramic view of Budapest, the twisting Danube River and the hills beyond.