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Mogadishu, (InsideSomalia.org) Somali Prime Minister Nur Hassan Hussein reassured on Tuesday that his government was ready to start dialogue with the opposition to resolve more than 16 years of unrest in the country, as quoted by Reuters News Agency.
The Prime Minister said that his government is now working on a plan of all-inclusive reconciliation process as he rejected a proposal from Sheikh Sharif Ahmed who said talks were not possible unless Ethiopian Troops withdraw from Somalia.
Islamist leader Ahmed said on Friday talks were possible if war crimes are punished and Ethiopian troops withdrawn
Prime Minister Nur Hassan Hussein said the withdrawal of Ethiopian peacekeepers could not be a precondition for talks.
. "The first condition should be that we have to talk and agree about something ... we are ready to start discussion with opposition groups and one of the points to be discussed would be the Ethiopian troops," he said.
Premier Nur Hassan Hussein who is in Brussels for talks met today with Javier Solana, European Union Higher Commission for Foreign Affairs said on Saturday that no government exits in the country by the time it is under the Ethiopian occupation.
Sheik Sharif Sheik, former leader of the deposed Union of Islamic Courts, told in an interview with the local media today that his organization is condemning what happening in Mogadishu as genocide against the civilians.
"The human violations in the country are rejecting us to open dialogue with the government of Nor Adde," said Sheik Ahmed.
Somali President Abdullahi Yusuf said that his government will take a unique stance towards a dialogue with the opposition.
In an interview with a German news agency, he said that the government prefers talking with the moderate figures of the Union of Islamic Courts.
"We are not negotiating with terrorist neither inside nor outside of the country" said President Yusuf.
"We are ready for reconciliation to resolve conflicts in the country but only one individual can not foremost it" he added but he ruled out reports indicating that there is a difference between him and his premier Nur Hassan Hussein.
The Ethiopian government sent thousands of its forces in Somalia to protect the internationally recognized government and drove the Islamic Courts Union out of the country late December 2006.
Hard-line Islamists have since led an insurgency that has claimed at least 6,500 lives and prompted 600,000 to flee the capital in the latest convulsion of violence to hit Somalia.
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