Bizimungu says ceasefire not formalised

Rwandan President Pasteur Bizimungu said yesterday there was consensus on a “general wish” for a DRC ceasefire at the Paris summit, but a truce was not agreed. “Everyone agreed on the necessity of a ceasefire but everyone did not agree on how it should be carried out. That’s all that happened in Paris,” he told a press conference in Kigali. He said Rwandan troops would remain in the DRC as long as Kigali’s security interests were threatened. He also denied any rift with Kampala over the DRC intervention.

Meanwhile, Ugandan presidential spokeswoman Hope Kivengere told IRIN it was “very clear” at the Paris meeting “that nobody really wants to fight”. She said once a ceasefire is agreed politically by all sides, “a troop standstill is the easiest thing to do and shouldn’t take long. It takes more energy to fight than not to fight.”