21/10/08 (B470-B) Shabelle avec ENA / Le Premier ministre éthiopien envoie ses invitations pour participer à la Conférence sur la Somalie qui se tiendra au Kenya sous l’égide de l’IGAD.Les dirigeants des pays membres sont invités à participer // Ethiopian premier sending invitations for Somalia talks in Kenya (En Anglais – Info lecteur)

As the current chairperson of IGAD (Inter-Governmental Authority on Development) , Prime Minister Meles (Zenawi) has begun to send out invitations for the IGAD meeting on Somalia to be held in Nairobi on 27-29 October.

It had originally been intended to hold the meeting in Baidoa , the seat of the Somali transitional parliament, but Kenya had offered Nairobi.

Those invited include the heads of state and foreign ministers of all current members of IGAD (Djibouti, Kenya, Somalia, Sudan and Uganda); Eritrea, of course, suspended its participation from IGAD last year.

Others invited to attend include the chairman of the AU Commission, the special representative for Somalia of the UN secretary-general, Mr Ould-Abdullah; and the IGAD Partners Forum, of which the Italian ambassador is the local chair, as well as, of course, the leading members of Somalia’s transitional federal institutions, including the prime minister, the speaker of the parliament and all the members of the Somali parliament.

The decision to hold an IGAD summit on Somalia was taken by IGAD ministers attending the UN General Assembly in New York and endorsed by the AMISOM (AU mission in Somalia) troop-contributing countries.