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Rwanda, DRC Leaders to Meet and Discuss Conflict, Angola's Foreign Minister Says

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FILE — Rwanda's President Paul Kagame meets with his Congolese counterpart Felix Tshisekedi and Angola's President Joao Lourenco, at the Great Lakes International Conference, in Luanda, Angola, on July 6, 2022.
FILE — Rwanda's President Paul Kagame meets with his Congolese counterpart Felix Tshisekedi and Angola's President Joao Lourenco, at the Great Lakes International Conference, in Luanda, Angola, on July 6, 2022.

LUANDA— Rwanda's President Paul Kagame has agreed to meet his counterpart from the Democratic Republic of Congo, Felix Tshisekedi, to discuss security in the Central African nation's volatile eastern regions, according to Angola's foreign minister.

Fighting between the mostly Tutsi M23 (March 23) rebels and DRC forces has flared in the the country's east, displacing more than 100,000 people, according to the United Nations.

The DRC, the United Nations and Western nations accuse Rwanda of backing the rebel group, an allegation Kigali denies.

"It was decided that President (Paul) Kagame would agree to meet President (Felix) Tshisekedi on a date to be indicated by the mediator," Angola's Tete Antonio told the press.

The declaration followed a meeting in Angola's capital Luanda between Rwanda's Kagame and Angolan President Joao Lourenco, the African Union's (AU) mediator.

"The Heads of State agreed on key steps towards addressing the root causes of the conflict, and the need to uphold the Luanda and Nairobi processes to achieve peace and stability in the region," Rwanda's presidency said on X, formerly Twitter.

At the end of February, the DRC presidency said on X, quoting Tete Antonio, "President Felix Tshisekedi has in principle given his agreement to meet his Rwandan counterpart."

But it added that "Felix Tshisekedi is demanding the withdrawal of RDF (Rwandan) troops from Congolese territory, the cessation of hostilities and the M23 rebel quarters before meeting Paul Kagame."

Kagame and Tshisekedi last met in Ethiopia's capital on February 16 on the sideline of the AU leaders summit, during a "mini-summit" organized by Lourenco.

According to two diplomatic sources in Addis Ababa, the meeting was very tense and ended with an "exchange of insults."

Mario Paiva an independent Angolan journalist said he is confident that the mediation by Angola's president will positively impact the talks between Kagame and Tshisekedi.

"I think after the last African Union Summit in Addis Ababa that gave credentials to Mr. Lourenco to mediate and set up these kinds of meetings between the two sides we could see maybe some kind of progress," Paiva said.

"We will need to wait and see for a clear picture about what kind of concessions both DRC and Rwanda are ready to do in a way to facilitate this meeting," he added.

After eight years of dormancy, the M23 rebels took up arms again at the end of 2021 and seized large swathes of the North Kivu region, which borders Rwanda.

At the end of 2023, the U.N. estimated that nearly seven million people were displaced in DRC, including 2.5 million in North Kivu alone.

VOA's James Butty contributed to this report. Some information was sourced from Agence France-Presse.

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