EAST African Community (EAC) leaders agreed, on Monday, to harmonise regional mechanisms to bring an end to the insecurity in eastern Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC).
The agreement was reached during a high level meeting in Egypt on the sidelines of the ongoing COP27 summit.
The meeting, chaired by President Evariste Ndayishimiye of Burundi, who is the chairperson of the EAC, was attended by Presidents Paul Kagame of Rwanda, William Ruto of Kenya, Samia Suluhu Hassan of Tanzania as well as Prime Minister Sama Lukonde of DRC, who represented President Felix Tshisekedi, and the EAC Secretary General Peter Mathuki.
According to a communiqué released by the EAC after the high-level consultative meeting of the summit of EAC heads of state on the peace process in the eastern DRC, the leaders had agreed to harmonise the EAC’s efforts with the Angola-mediated process of the International Conference on the Great Lakes Region (ICGLR), called the Luanda roadmap.
The meeting took note that the force headquarters of the joint regional force of the EAC in Eastern DRC has been established in Goma and that a regional force commander has been appointed and assumed duties.
The summit decided that each partner state will deploy a liaison officer at the force headquarters to support the regional command centre.
The heads of state took note and commended Burundi, Kenya and Uganda who have already deployed forces in line with the agreed framework and urged South Sudan to complete the deployment.
They also took note of the operationasation of the EAC peace facility to support the EAC-led Nairobi process and deeply appreciated the African Union (AU) Chairperson and President of Senegal, Macky Sall and the Chairperson of the international conference on the Great Lakes Region (ICGLR) and Angola President Joao Lourenco, for demonstrating solidarity with EAC through contribution to the EAC special fund for implementation of the peace process.
According to the communiqué, the heads of state appreciated the partner states –Uganda, Kenya, Rwanda and Tanzania for their commitment to contribute to the EAC special fund for the implementation of the peace process and urged all partner states to sustainably support the facility.
They reviewed the recent developments in North Kivu, particularly the resurgence of violence and called for cessation of hostilities to give chance to the political negotiations due to commence from November 16th this year in Nairobi, Kenya.
As one of the peaceful attempts to pacify eastern DRC, the Luanda roadmap was signed in July this year, after a tripartite summit between Presidents Kagame, Tshisekedi and Angola’s João Lourenço, who is the chair of the ICGLR.
The conflict in eastern DRC between government forces (FARDC) and the M23 rebels escalated on October 20, when the insurgents renewed attacks, capturing key territories.
