Three Somali factions meeting in the northeastern city of Garowe on Friday called for the formation of four regional states to establish a new Federal Republic of Somalia.
The demand came from Puntland leader Abdullahi Youssuf Ahmed, Rahanwein Resistance Army (RRA) commander Hassan Mohamud Nur "Shatigudud" and General Aden Abdullahi Nur "Gabyow" of the Somali Patriotic Front (SPM).
The three suggested that these states should be Puntland, a self-proclaimed autonomous territory in the northeast, the self-styled "independent" Somaliland in the northwest, a state in central Somalia and another in the southwest.
The faction leaders also called for the formation of a technical committee to prepare a new national reconciliation conference for the country, which has been torn among rival warlords since the collapse of central government with the May 1991 ouster of dictator Mohamed Siad Barre.
Most of the warlords reject the authority of a government newly formed by President Abdulkassim Salat Hassan, a head of state chosen this year by Somali parliamentarians meeting in exile in neighboring Djibouti.
The Garowe proposal for a new federal state was made in a joint communiqué faxed to AFP here.
The chairman of the Southern Somali National Movement (SSNM), Abdullahi Sheikh Ismail, who is in Nairobi and endorsed the outcome of the Garowe meeting, also appealed to the international community to show political and diplomatic restraints in Somalia.
Ismail urged the international community not to extend financial assistance Somalia that could be used to perpetuate violence in the war torn Horn of Africa nation.
The Garowe meeting also called for the "liberation" of areas currently occupied by alien clans, a reference to the presence of militiamen of Habr Gedir in southern Somalia's Lower Shabelle and Middle and Lower Juba regions.
"The clans that occupy the land of others should vacate to avert renewed bloodshed in Somalia," the communiqué warned.
Signatories of the communiqué, which was the outcome of a three-day meeting, later told AFP by telephone that they considered the establishment of a Somali government at the Djibouti resort of Arta was "a hostile action that could provoke further violence in Somalia" -- NAIROBI (AFP)
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