Four nations confer on African Great Lakes security

Democratic Republic of the Congo President Felix Tshisekedi chaired a summit on the Great Lakes Region from Goma, the capital of North Kivu province. /AFP

The presidents of four countries conferred by video on Wednesday over security in the African Great Lakes region, where armed groups pose a chronic threat, DR Congo said.

The twice-postponed talks gathered the heads of Angola, Democratic Republic of Congo, Rwanda and Uganda, the Congolese president's office said. Burundi did not take part.

"The aim of this digital meeting is to achieve the strengthening of good neighbourly relations by multiplying efforts by the countries concerned in favour of cooperation, pacification and the stabilisation of eastern DRC and the Great Lakes sub-region," a statement said.

The summit would look at "the political, diplomatic and security situation, health cooperation, the fight against illegal exploitation and trade (in natural resources) and cooperation against COVID-19," it added.

President Felix Tshisekedi chaired the summit from Goma, the capital of North Kivu province, where hundreds of people have been massacred over the last year by the Allied Democratic Forces (ADF), a militia which originated in the 1990s as a Ugandan Muslim rebel group.

Two other eastern provinces, South Kivu and Ituri, are also struggling with armed groups, many of them with ethnic roots.

Burundian President Evariste Ndayishimiye had been invited to attend, but gave notice on September 8 that he would not take part.

Ndayishimiye received DR Congo Foreign Minister Marie Tumba Nzeza on Monday.

The countries agreed to promote exchange of information "especially on cross-border security" and to stage "patrols" to oversee navigation on Lake Tanganyika, which the two states share, a joint statement said.

DR Congo, the largest country in sub-Saharan Africa, has sometimes fractious relationships with its neighbors — a legacy of two regional wars, in 1996-97 and 1998-2003, in which it accused Burundi, Rwanda and Uganda of supporting insurgencies in the east of the country.

Source(s): AFP