Immediately ending all hostilities in the Democratic Republic of the Congo’s east has been demanded by regional heads of state.
As the Congo and the neighboring Rwanda swap accusations of supporting armed rebels, tensions there have increased amid talk of war.
At the conclusion of the East African Community (EAC) conference in Burundi, a communiqué called for a stop to hostilities.
Secretary General of the EAC, Peter Mathuki, said: “There must be immediate ceasefire by all political parties.
He added: “The withdraw including all foreign armed groups and directed the chief of defence forces of all the partners states of East African Community to meet urgently within the next one week and set new timelines for the withdrawal and the commend appropriate deployment matrix in different parts of eastern DRC.”
The appeals come in response to international worry that two countries, as they did in the late 1990s and early 2000s, could descend into a full-fledged conflict.
Last month, Rwanda fired on a military plane it claimed was infringing its airspace.
Mathuki said: “The heads of state called upon parties to respect and implement all the summits decisions and agreed upon themselves that any again violation should be reported immediately and the summit now will take the charge of this process.”
Congo has been accusing Rwanda of backing the M23 armed group, whose roots are in the ethnic strife in the area, for months, and prominent figures in the West have openly concurred.
The M23 is one of dozens of rebel groups operating in the mineral-rich eastern Congo. Rwanda accuses Congo of supporting yet another rebel group, although Congo denies this.
