Mogadishu - President General Addeh Museh said he would form a panel of experts to prepare a report on whether the region of Puntland needs to be governed by Islamic law, officials said.
"The president said that in the future, he will form a committee of traditional leaders, clerics, politicians and scholars to prepare a report whether Puntland needs Islamic law," the region's Information Minister Abdirahman Mohamed Banka said.
"The president neither said Puntland will be governed by Sharia law nor when he will form the committee. He made it very clear that no decision has been made and that the proposal was on discussion stage," he added.
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Banka said the northeastern region, which broke away from Somalia proper in 1998 and has since been been peaceful, will be governed by secular law until the law is changed.
Under the Puntland constitution, the cabinet and parliament must approve a bill before it becomes law.
The minister said the region is ready for dialogue with other groups in Somalia in a bid to end 15 years of conflict that has rocked the lawless African nation.
"We are tired of war. Now we prefer talks," he said.
Analyst said the move is an apparent indication that region was distancing itself from President Abdullahi Yusuf Ahmed, who ruled it before he was elected Somalia's transitional leader in 2004.
Transitional government spokesperson Abdirahman Mohamed Nur Dinari said Puntland had the right to make its decision.
"There is no problem, Puntland has the right to do what it wants," Dinari said.
A powerful Islamic movement seized Mogadishu from US-backed warlords in June and has since used the city as a base to take most of southern and central Somalia where they have imposed strict Sharia law.
The Islamists, who recently clashed with Puntland forces in the central Mudug region, have urged the semi-autonomous region to accept Sharia law or see it imposed forcefully.
Somalia has lacked an effective government since dictator Mohamed Siad Barre was toppled, but Yusuf's two-year-old government has failed to exert control across the country of about 10 million. - Sapa-AFP
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