Opposition wants talks to resume 20 Nov in SA

Opposition groups of the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) announced from Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, on Tuesday that they want the inter-Congolese dialogue to resume on 20 November in South Africa, AFP reported.

In a joint communique, delegations of unarmed political opposition groups and the three main armed opposition groups - the Rwandan-backed Rassemblement congolais pour la democratie (RCD-Goma), the Ugandan-backed Mouvement pour la liberation du Congo (MLC), and the splinter RCD-Mouvement de Liberation (RCD-ML), also backed by Uganda - called on talks facilitator Ketumile Masire to "convene in 30 days [...] a new meeting of the inter-Congolese dialogue in South Africa".

The dialogue opened in the Ethiopian capital on 15 October, but was impeded by a lack of funds and disagreement among parties on how to proceed. Frustrated, the DRC government delegation left Addis Ababa on Friday, much to the dismay of other participants and leaving former Botswanan president to adjourn the talks on Sunday until an unspecified date. Even before last week's opening ceremony, however, Kinshasa had dismissed the scaled-down meeting in Addis Ababa as a mere technical stage and not the real dialogue as provided for in the 1999 Lusaka peace agreement.

It is widely believed that the talks will resume November in South Africa, whose government has offered to assume a large share of expenses. A spokeswoman for the DRC government delegation at the talks in Addis Ababa told IRIN last week that Durban was the most likely venue. Pretoria had earlier offered to help meet the cost of accommodation and transport. Telecommunications links are far superior in South Africa, from where televised sessions of the meetings could be relayed to the DRC.