TOM MALITI
Associated Press
NAIROBI, Kenya - Somalia inaugurated a transitional parliament Sunday, taking an important first step toward forming a new government for the devastated country even as rivalries continue to plague a peace process still far from complete.
Newly chosen members of the 275-member assembly took their oaths in a ceremony attended by regional diplomats and U.N. officials, who promised to support the latest of more than a dozen attempts to restore order to the Horn of Africa nation.
Leaders of Somalia's major clans have been meeting in Kenya since October 2002 in an attempt to end 13 years of fighting. They hope to establish the first effective central government since 1991, when warlords ousted dictator Mohamed Siad Barre before turning on each other, plunging the country into chaos.
As traditional Somali dancers and singers performed, former enemies took their oaths Sunday and celebrated the parliament's first official meeting.
"All of us, we are very happy. We are smelling the fruit of national unity." said Abdulkadir Farah Guelid, a parliamentarian from the northeastern Puntland region who was sworn in Sunday.
Participants in the peace process - funded by the European Union, the United Nations, Somalia's neighbors and China - must still find a way to disarm the gunmen who control Somalia. But there was optimism on Sunday that at last there was a forum to discuss the issue.
"Somalia, today has, at last, a parliament - a transitional parliament - but a fully legitimate parliament, since all of the Somali political and military and traditional forces have been involved in its formation," said Italian ambassador Carlo Calia, the lead EU diplomat at the talks.
An initial group of 196 parliamentarians were sworn in last week, when the 275-member assembly was originally supposed to begin work. But the start was delayed because one of the country's four major clans had not finished selecting its representatives.
Several dozen more lawmakers were sworn in on Sunday.
Kenyan diplomat Bethuel Kiplagat, chief mediator at the talks, said the transitional parliament would get down to business immediately - choosing a speaker whose first duty will be to preside over the election of a president. The president will then nominate a prime minister to form a government.