Informed Sources

SOMALIA SECESSION?

When U.S. forces complete their withdrawal from Somalia on March 31, the nation may split in two. MOHAMMED IBRAHIM EGAL, President of Somaliland, was in Nairobi in recent weeks trying to win support for the notion that the region he rules in the north -- which no state recognizes as a country -- should remain independent and not be reincorporated into Somalia.

CLINTON'S PLANS FOR THE EQUAL EMPLOYMENT OPPORTUNITY COMMISSION

New York lawyer IDA CASTRO is the leading contender to head the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission. One reason she's topping the list: she has ties to Harold Ickes, new White House deputy chief of staff. Clinton had hoped to fill the eeoc slot and several other civil rights posts before Martin Luther King Day.

HALPERIN DOWN BUT NOT OUT

MORTON HALPERIN, former director of the Washington office of the American Civil Liberties Union, withdrew his name from consideration for a top Pentagon job last week. Attacks from conservatives on the Senate Armed Services Committee were the reason for his decision. But Halperin may still work in the Administration, White House sources say. If he is proposed for a job at the State Department, the more congenial Senate Foreign Relations Committee might well approve, so a position there is one possibility. Another is a post at the National Security Council, which would not require Senate confirmation.