Gambiaj.com – (LUANDA, Angola) – The presidents of Rwanda and the Democratic Republic of Congo were to meet this Sunday in Angola for a fresh round of talks aimed at ending the conflict in the DRC’s troubled east. But the talks almost immediately hit a ‘deadlock’, according to the representative of the DRC.

Talks due Sunday between the leaders of Rwanda and the Democratic Republic of Congo to end conflict in the eastern DRC were called off, the Angolan presidency said.

“Contrary to what we expected, the summit will no longer be held today,” the presidency’s media officer Mario Jorge told journalists.

Joao Lourenco, the African Union mediator to end the conflict, was meeting alone with DRC leader Felix Tshisekedi, Jorge said.

Rwandan President Paul Kagame had been expected at the meeting but it was not clear if he was in Angola.

There had been hopes the talks would reach an agreement to end conflict in the eastern DRC, where the Rwanda-backed M23 militia has seized swathes of territory, displacing thousands and triggering a humanitarian crisis.

The Congolese presidency said that negotiations had hit deadlock over a Rwandan demand that DRC hold direct dialogue with the M23 rebels.
Ongoing conflict

Since its reemergence in 2021 the Kigali-backed M23 militia, which claims to defend ethnic Tutsis, has seized swathes of DRC territory, displacing thousands and triggering a humanitarian crisis.

In early August, Angola mediated a fragile truce that stabilized the situation at the front line, but both sides continued to exchange fire and clashes have intensified since late October.

Angolan President Joao Lourenco, appointed by the African Union as a mediator, voiced hope Thursday that the summit in Luanda could lead to a peace deal.

“We are optimistic that this meeting eventually will produce all the signing or the decision for soon signing a long-lasting peace agreement between the two neighboring countries,” Lourenco said during a visit to South Africa.

Kigali confirmed that Rwandan President Paul Kagame would attend the summit on Sunday, joined by his foreign minister Olivier Nduhungirehe.

The Congolese presidency also confirmed that Felix Tshisekedi would participate, despite the DRC’s previous refusals to negotiate with Rwanda and its calls for international sanctions against its neighbor.

“Our country continues to face persistent rebellions, including the aggression by the Rwandan army and the M23 terrorists,” Tshisekedi said in parliament Wednesday, calling the militants and Rwanda “enemies of the Republic”.

The capital of DRC’s North Kivu province Goma, home to about one million people and another million displaced by war, is now nearly surrounded by M23 rebels and the Rwandan army.
Ninety days

Early in November, the two central African neighbors launched a committee to monitor ceasefire violations, led by Angola and including representatives from both the DRC and Rwanda.

Kinshasa and Kigali a few weeks later approved a concept of operations document setting out the terms by which Rwandan troops will disengage from Congolese territory.

A previous draft dated in August listed the dismantling of a militia created by ethnic Hutus involved in the Rwandan genocide in 1994 as a precondition for Rwanda’s withdrawal.

Often portrayed by Kigali as a threat to its security, the Democratic Forces for the Liberation of Rwanda (FDLR) is one of various disparate militias fighting alongside the Congolese army against the M23.

The August draft was rejected by the DRC, which demanded that the withdrawal occur at the same time as the FDLR’s dismantling.

The final strategic document, seen by AFP, plans for a period of 90 days to “conclude the neutralization of the FDLR and the lifting of Rwanda’s defensive measures“.

The two presidents last saw each other in October in Paris but did not speak, though they have maintained dialogue through the mediation of Luanda.

Home to a string of rival armed groups, the mineral-rich eastern DRC has been plagued by internal and cross-border violence for the past three decades.

(AFP)