MPs offer talks to end impasse over capital

NAIROBI, Nov 17 (Reuters) - Warlords and lawmakers in the Somali capital have agreed to hold talks with their political foes to end months of wrangling which has threatened to undermine the lawless state's fledgling government.

Somalia's year-old transitional government, formed at peace talks in Kenya, is sharply split over where it should be based.

President Abdullahi Yusuf and his supporters favour Jowhar, 90 km (55 miles) north of Mogadishu which they say is safer than the capital.

But powerful Mogadishu-based warlords, who are also cabinet ministers led by parliamentary speaker Sharif Hassan Sheikh Adan and nearly 100 MPs, want the government to move to Mogadishu.

The decision by the Mogadishu group to hold talks with Yusuf's allies was made during a session chaired by Hassan on Wednesday.

"We welcome the initiative by our Mogadishu friends to end the differences without any conditions," government spokesman Abdirahman Dinari said on Thursday.

"It's good they have now accepted to engage in dialogue in any location inside Somalia. This has always been what President Yusuf and (Prime Minister Mohamed Ali) Gedi insisted on."

Dinari said the two sides had yet to agree on where and when the talks would start. He could not comment on a request by the Mogadishu-based MPs for donors to play an observer role.

"It's true we have agreed to engage them in dialogue," lawmaker Omar Hashi told Reuters by telephone, speaking on behalf of the Mogadishu-based legislators.

"We reached the decision for the sake of our country and people. Since the differences were growing acrimonious and threatening our young government," he said.

Somalia has been without a central government since 1991 when warlords ousted former dictator Mohamed Siad Barre, dividing the failed state of 10 million people into fiefdoms.

The U.N. Security Council last week scolded Somalia's squabbling government, urging rival factions to come together to confront the chaos and piracy plaguing the anarchic country.

Francois Lonseny Fall, the U.N. special envoy for Somalia, who recently tried without success to bridge differences in the government welcomed the latest efforts by MPs.

"The U.N. and international community welcomes any initiative to solve the differences. We will always encourage and facilitate dialogue among Somali leaders," he said.