Nairobi, October 25, 2007 – The UN special envoy to Somalia on Thursday exhorted the leaders of the war-torn nation to patch up differences that have stifled effective governance in recent months.

Ahmedou Ould Abdallah said the power struggle between President Abdillahi Yusuf Ahmed and Prime Minister Ali Mohamed Gedi was "unhelpful" in the face of escalating insurgency and a deepening humanitarian crisis in the country.

Yusuf is pushing parliament to oust Gedi on the grounds that he has failed to end the insurgency raging in the capital Mogadishu, formulate a new constitution and install a federal system of government.

"This internal crisis is not helping Somalia to be of interest to the international community," Ould Abdallah said in Nairobi, where he was meeting foreign diplomats to discuss ways of helping the country.

Conflict flared after Barre was ousted

Saudi King Abdullah invited the president, the prime minister and parliament speaker Aden Mohamed Nur to the oil rich kingdom on Wednesday in a bid to reconcile them following the disagreement that has paralyzed the government.

Underlying the power struggle is the kind of clan rivalry that has fuelled seemingly endless and bloody power struggles in Somalia since it acquired independence in 1960.

Conflict flared after Mohamed Siyad Barre was ousted in 1991. Since then, Somalia has had no central authority and defied dozens of initiatives to restore stability.

Source: AFP