Outstanding issues delaying peace in the Great Lakes region will be the focus of a meeting between four African leaders in Cape Town on Wednesday.
Deputy foreign minister Aziz Pahad said last week’s slaughter of more than 900 people in the Democratic Republic of Congo was among several factors adding urgency to the summit.
”They … (will) work out what the outstanding issues are to try to prevent any further escalation of conflict.”
President Thabo Mbeki is to host the talks that will be attended by presidents Joseph Kabila of the DRC, Paul Kagame of Rwanda, Yoweri Museveni of Uganda and Benjamin Mkapa of Tanzania.
The massacre in the northeastern Ituri province of the DRC came a day after the signing of an accord to end over four years of war in the central African country.
Eyewitnesses confirmed the slaughter, the UN mission in DRC (Monuc) reported.
It said 966 people from the minority Hema ethnic group were ”summarily executed” within three hours by members of the Lendu majority.
Pahad said it was important for each of the four leaders to put forward the problems they experienced — ”so that we don’t have a repetition of the latest massacre”.
The Congolese Rally for Democracy rebel group said it believed the Ugandan army and the Kinshasa government had been partly responsible for the. Other observers claim Rwanda and Uganda have exacerbated ethnic violence.
Pahad said South Africa was concerned about relations between Uganda and Rwanda, which backed different rebel groups in the civil war in the DRC.
”In the last few months there have been increasing reports about the growing tensions. Clearly, for some time, the tensions have been quite high.”
This should also be a topic at Wednesday’s meeting.
Pahad said the signing of the accord remained a historical achievement, but conditions were difficult for putting the agreements into effect.
”We don’t want people to get disillusioned whenever there is a setback. We must now expect that there will be setbacks.”
The positive elements in the picture were unchanged.
”We will now, in tomorrow’s (Wednesday) meeting try to push the positive factors forward,” Pahad said
Turning to peace efforts in Burundi, Pahad said Deputy President Jacob Zuma, who acts as mediator, would leave for Belgium on Wednesday to seek concrete assistance.
”We will also see whether we can convince the European Union that this is a very decisive moment and that they must come on board.”
A matter of concern was continued divisions as the leadership of the Burundi transitional government was scheduled to be rotated next month.
”We still have not reached the situation where all the armed formations have agreed to the ceasefire,” Pahad said. – Sapa