Accra, June 30, GNA - President John Agyekum Kufuor on Monday called on world leaders to enhance interpersonal relations as they strived to attain global peace.

He said the road map to peace in the world would best be chartered if World Leaders intensified their people to people relationships by extending the hand of friendship to all.

President Kufuor said this in a speech read for him by Nana Akomea, Minister for Information, at the opening of the 12th annual U.S. Africa Sister Cities Conference in Accra.

"Our people look forward hungrily to the day when cities all over the world would have this golden handshake of friendship with each other, solving common problems together, sharing the challenges of human life together, making our world a better place as a legacy for posterity," he said.

The 10-day conference, the third to be held in Africa, is on the theme: "Strengthening Sister Cities in Africa; A Focus on HIV/AIDS Crises, Business, Trade Investment and Democratic Governance."

Senegal and Kenya were the other two countries to have hosted the conference, which aimed to promote local community initiatives in line with decentralization as well as promote international peaceful co-existence as a prelude to improving international trade and investment.

The Ghana Sister Cities Foundation and the Metropolitan City of Accra are organising the conference under the auspices of the Ministry of Local Government and Rural Development.

President Kufuor said real peace had proven to be elusive although formal institutions like the United Nations had been trying to overcome political difference with the aim to maintain the peace.

"The success of these efforts is largely measured by the constant wars and rumours of wars that bedevil our globe today and thereafter even the very survival of humanity," he said.

President Kufuor said it was in this direction that the important role being played by informal organizations such as the sister cities to promote the peace should be a welcomed relief.

Mr Kwadjo Adjei Darko, Minister of Local Government and Rural Development, said government believed that effective decentralization would enhance participation and the economic well being of the people.

It is in line with this commitment to bring governance to the people at the lower levels that government was creating more sub-metro and district councils. Seven more sub-metros would be established in Accra to bring the number to 13, six in Kumasi to make the number 10 and two more in Shama-Ahanta to bring the total to five.

Sheikh Ibrahim Cudjoe Quaye, Greater Accra Regional Minister, said there were currently nine cities, which were in partnership with the US-Africa Sister Cities programme.

He expressed the hope that the conference would provide the opportunity for participants to discuss ways to confront the menace of the HIV/AIDS pandemic. In a symbolic gesture, the Mayor of Accra, Solomon Ofei Darko presented the key to Accra city to Shirley Rivens Smith, President of the US-Africa Sister Cities Foundation.

This gives participants' access and opportunity to explore every corner of the city.