British, French ministers push for Congolese peace process

In a joint effort to reinvigorate the Congolese peace process, British and French foreign ministers Jack Straw and Hubert Vedrine have told Democratic Republic of Congo President Joseph Kabila that he must disarm the Hutu militias who participated in the 1994 genocide in Rwanda. The ministers told Kabila during talks on Monday in the Congolese capital, Kinshasa, that disarming the militia who fled Rwanda to Congo with the former Rwandan army, the ex-FAR, was essential to peace, the Financial Times, a London newspaper, reported. The war in the Democratic Republic of Congo involved Ugandan and Rwandan troops who came to support local anti-government forces. Angola, Namibia and Zimbabwe subsequently sent troops in support of the former Congolese president Laurent-Desire Kabila. A regional peace accord was signed in 1999 in Lusaka, Zambia, that provides for the withdrawal of all foreign troops from the Congo and the disarmament of militia groups such as the Rwandan Hutus. The terms of the accord have not, however, been fully implemented. Straw and Vedrine are expected to urge Rwandan President Paul Kagame, when they meet on Tuesday, to comply with the Lusaka accord by withdrawing all his troops from the Congo, the Financial Times reported. Rwanda had, however, insisted that the DRC-based Hutus who, they fear, may try to invade Rwanda, be disarmed before Kigali withdraws its troops, the paper added. Meanwhile, Kabila had called on Britain to "unblock things" and resolve the Congolese conflict, AFP reported. Kabila had said London "would just have to say one word on Rwanda and Uganda, whose troops are on DRC territory, for things to change", the agency reported. Rwandan and Ugandan troops currently occupy large areas of northern and eastern DRC. Following their visits to Congo and Rwanda, Straw and Vedrine will end their three-day tour of the Great Lakes region with stops in Burundi and Uganda. A French diplomatic source said they would press the leaders of all four of the region's countries to make the necessary compromises to implement the separate peace accords for Congo and Burundi, and set the stage for international talks, Reuters reported.