By Andrew Cawthorne
NAIROBI (Reuters) - Kenya's feuding parties resumed talkson Tuesday after a torrent of calls from home and abroad tosolve a post-election crisis that has killed 1,000 people andtarnished the east African nation's reputation.
Foreign powers and the majority of Kenya's 36 millionpeople are impatient for President Mwai Kibaki and oppositionleader Raila Odinga to find a political solution to theircountry's darkest moment since independence in 1963.
Their dispute over who won the December 27 electionunleashed protests and ethnic attacks that have traumatised thepopulation, displaced 300,000 people, and hurt Kenya's image asa stable democracy and peacemaker in the region.
"The time for a political settlement was yesterday," U.S.Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said at the end of her tripto Kenya to push for a power-sharing deal.
Apart from hardliners on both sides, a similar message isreverberating around Kenya from businessmen, clerics,grassroots groups and ordinary citizens, who are increasinglyangry with the political class for allowing the crisis to dragon.
Negotiators went into Tuesday's talks at an upmarketNairobi hotel without a word to waiting reporters, who askedthe government side if it would accept a "grand coalition" asRice, mediator Kofi Annan and other foreign powers havesuggested.
Officials from Kibaki's Party of National Unity (PNU) andOdinga's Orange Democratic Movement (ODM) have agreed onprinciples to end violence and help displaced families.
They also agree in principle that the opposition must bebrought into government somehow -- but are stuck on thedetails.
"SIEGE MENTALITY"
The deadline set by former U.N. boss Annan for a politicaldeal by mid-February has passed, even after last week's trip toa secluded safari lodge to focus minds. But the Ghanaian hasvowed to stay until mediation reaches an "irreversible point".
Vice-president Kalonzo Musyoka -- who first allied withOdinga then broke off to run as a third candidate in theDecember election before throwing his lot in with Kibaki afterthe results -- was upbeat about the negotiations.
"The government and the ODM are talking the same language,"he said, noting they had already managed to stem post-electionviolence and address the humanitarian crisis.
While the government is prepared to give ODM somerepresentation in cabinet, the opposition wants a virtual 50:50arrangement with a strong position like a new prime minister'spost for Odinga. It also wants a new election within two years.
Kenyan political pundit Macharia Gaitho said Kibaki wascaught between pressure from abroad to give way, and pressurefrom his own hardliners not to let ODM take too much power.
"The U.S., Britain and other major Western powers all seemto have come to the conclusion that the Kibaki government isbecoming the impediment," he wrote.
"A siege mentality is creeping in as hardliners ingovernment prevail with the view that the mediation process hasbecome a device which the opposition, backed by the West, isusing to force its way into what would amount to a virtualtakeover of government."
On the ground, the crisis has produced unprecedentedpopulation flows among communities terrified of more violence.
Thousands of members of Kibaki's Kikuyu group, Kenya'slargest, have been trooping back to their heartland in thecentral highlands.
Many of Odinga's Luo community, and people from othertribes deemed pro-opposition, have also been heading in theopposite direction back to their ancestral homelands.
(For special coverage from Reuters on Kenya's crisis see:http ://africa.reuters.com/elections/kenya/)
(Additional reporting by Duncan Miriri, Editing by DanielWallis and Giles Elgood)
