21 May 2007: ISS Today: Italy Urges Reconciliation, Ceasefire in Somalia

21 May 2007: Italy Urges Reconciliation, Ceasefire in Somalia
Reuters

A senior Italian envoy flew into Mogadishu on Saturday urging warring Somalis to embrace a ceasefire and throwing Rome`s endorsement behind an upcoming national reconciliation conference. Patrizia Sentinelli, Italy`s deputy foreign minister, met President Abdullahi Yusuf and Prime Minster Ali Mohamed Gedi on her one-day visit to Rome`s former protectorate which has been in chaos for the last 17 years.

"Security can only be realised through a ceasefire," she said in Mogadishu, where there has been a relative lull after fighting earlier this year between allied Somali-Ethiopia troops and insurgents killed at least 1,300 people. The Somali government, which says it has defeated insurgents including militant Islamists and some elements of the local Hawiye clan, has called a reconciliation conference for mid-June involving hundreds of delegates from round Somalia.

"We request that the (conference) be an all-inclusive political process," Sentinelli added. "(We agreed) clans would independently and freely select their representatives ... We have an official promise that the (conference) will take place in a harmonious way."

Commentary

It has been evident to most observers that an attempted military solution to Somalia’s protracted political problems was always going to prove incomplete and, in many ways, counterproductive, As it happened, Ethiopia’s one month plan to pacify Mogadishu ahead of a prospective reconciliation congress, originally planned for mid-April but now postponed to mid-June, has resulted not only in massive loss of civilian lives and property in Mogadishu, but has made it almost impossible for the Transitional Federal Government (TFG) to depict itself as an impartial arbiter in national affairs.

But by its excesses and by condoning those of the Ethiopian expeditionary forces in Somalia, the TFG has opened a narrow window of opportunity for the international diplomatic community to insist that the proposed conference be seen as a real attempt at reconciliation, rather than a staged congress of TFG allies and surrogates. Recent statements by Italy’s deputy minister for foreign affairs and by Ambassador John Yates, the new US envoy for Somalia, suggest that this opening may be worked upon, though this is not to say that all concerned governments share the same interpretation of what is happening or the preferred way forward.

Nevertheless, official spokesmen for the TFG have indicated that there has been some reconsideration of the previous refusal to countenance the participation of members of the Islamic courts, and even of ‘insurgents’, so long as they eschew violence and are elected to represent their clans.

This issue of representation is likely to prove a thorny one. Who will decide who is representative of a clan and who not? This was one of the principal weaknesses of the Mbagathi conference that led to the formation of the TFG. The international community will be expected to fund the eventual conference, its delegates now reduced to 1 325 from the original 3 000-odd. This gives the diplomats a definite interest in making sure that all opinions are accorded weight in its deliberations, failing which there can be no talk of the reconstruction of even a minimalist state in Somalia.

In the meantime, some way must be found to allow the Ethiopian forces to withdraw. Their continued presence is a constant indictment of the Darod-led TFG’s violent operation to cow Hawiye dominated Mogadishu into submission, and will completely negate any attempt to represent the government as legitimate in the eyes of many of the population. At this conference, Somalia’s interests should be seen to be paramount, not those of Ethiopia.

Yet the Ethiopian forces will find it difficult to extricate themselves without waiting for a replacement peacekeeping force from the African Union to reinforce the Ugandans. That the latter have started to take fatal casualties hardly acts as an incentive for other African states to fulfill their promises of military support. Nor is there much conviction that the AU itself is financially or managerially capable of sustaining an effective mission in this troubled country.

The UN is examining the parameters of a peacekeeping force of its own, but awaits developments on the political and diplomatic front. Even given the best will in the world, however, it would take months to put a UN force on the ground.

Sporadic violence and assassination attempts on leading government functionaries can be expected to continue in and around Mogadishu. There is little guarantee that those involved in these attacks are under any centralised or effective command, making the achievement of a ceasefire extremely problematic.

Given this situation it will be somewhat surprising if the conference takes place when and where it is planned. Nevertheless, that the TFG is making noises suggesting a softening of its exclusionist position is to be welcomed, encouraged and built upon.

Richard Cornwell, African Security Analysis Programme, ISS Tshwane (Pretoria)