May 21. (EUROPE PRESS) –
The Government of Somalia has extended to the tribal clans of the city of Las Anod an invitation to negotiate in Mogadishu, the capital, the end of months of hostilities with the forces of the semi-autonomous region of Somaliland, in the north of the country.
The invitation came after Somalia’s Minister of Communications and Technology, Jama Hasan Jalif, staged this Saturday the first visit by a government representative to the troubled city, the scene of a violent dispute between Somaliland forces — self-proclaimed as an autonomous republic in 1991, never recognized — and these tribal clans, supporters of the federal authorities.
According to sources from the Somali portal Hiraan on Line, the clans have not yet responded to the invitation given the differences between the groups, which make up the so-called Unity and Salvation Authority of the Sool, Sanaag and Cayn regions (SSC), on how to deal with the end of a crisis that has left some 200 dead since it broke out at the end of last year.
The conflict, finally unleashed and after months of tensions over the assassination of Abdifatá Abdulahi Abdi, alias ‘Hadrawi’, a politician opposed to the Somaliland authorities, has also involved neighboring Puntland, which Somaliland accuses of encouraging tribal clans for covert order of the Somali federal government.
The clans, on the other hand, accuse Somaliland of spreading false information about the conflict and ensure that the Puntland forces are not taking part in the Las Anod conflict where, according to their version, it is the tribes and the local population who are defending their city from attacks by Somaliland forces.
