NAIROBI, Kenya, Sept. 11 (UPI) -- The Somali national reconciliation conference is expected to reconvene this weekend in the Kenyan capital of Nairobi, after a three-week hiatus.
The peace talks broke up after the reading of a draft charter -- an interim constitution -- so Somali legal experts and a Kenyan constitutional lawyer could reconcile the different views "and come up with a clean document," James Kiboi of the Inter-Governmental Authority on Development told the U.N. Integrated Regional Information Networks.
The proceedings were also adjourned "due to the absence of a number of prominent leaders," a member of the Somali civil Society group attending the conference told IRIN. Some of the countries underwriting the cost of the talks felt "the conference will not be broad-based enough without the presence of these people and asked IGAD to give time to bring everyone on board," added the source.
Among those absent from the talks was Abdiqassim Salad Hassan, president of Somalia's Transitional National Government.