Congo rebels unhappy at government's wide talks invite

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By Andrew Cawthorne

NAIROBI (Reuters) - Eastern Congo rebels in Nairobi for U.N.-brokered peace talks with the government said on Monday they were not prepared to sit down with other insurgent groups.

The Democratic Republic of Congo government at the weekend invited around 20 other armed groups to participate in the talks, aimed at ending fighting in North Kivu province that has displaced a quarter of a million people since August.

But the delegation for General Laurent Nkunda's National Congress for the Defence of the People (CNDP) said that was "impossible" and it was in Kenya only for direct talks.

"We cannot allow discussions with 20 other militias. Otherwise we would stay at home. We have not made this journey for nothing," CNDP foreign affairs spokesman Rene Abandi said.

"They can meet Mai Mai (pro-government militia), or whoever they want, in Nairobi, Kinshasa or New York. Just not at the same table where we are."

While that difference raised the prospect of the talks failing before they had even started, there was no sign of other groups arriving in Nairobi, and the rebel-government discussions were due to start under U.N. auspices on Monday afternoon.

They would be the first face-to-face talks between Nkunda's Tutsi rebels and President Joseph Kabila's government, although neither leader was coming to Kenya.

Diplomats have cautiously welcomed the meeting as a first step towards defusing tensions that have threatened to escalate into another regional war.

The CNDP declared a cease-fire after reaching the gates of the North Kivu provincial capital Goma in late October. It has been generally respected by both the rebels and the army, leading to more than a month of relative calm in North Kivu.

However, clashes continue between Nkunda's fighters, and local Mai Mai militia and Rwandan Hutu rebels, who roam a province rich in gold, diamonds, coltan and tin and who often support Kabila's weak and chaotic army.

ROOTS OF WAR

Congo's information minister, Lambert Mende, said on Sunday the meeting in Nairobi would include all those armed groups who signed up to an earlier January peace deal.

"We don't want to leave anyone out," he told Reuters.

The government wants the Nairobi talks to take place within the framework of that accord, known by the Swahili name for peace 'Amani'. But the rebels want fresh discussions.

Kenyan Foreign Minister Moses Wetangula noted other peace processes Nairobi had hosted, like Somalia, took many months.

But the CNDP was hopeful of quick progress.

"We would like to talk quickly and go back home as quickly as possible, even though there are many issues to solve," Abandi said, urging the government also to formally sign a cease-fire.

U.S.-based Africa analyst John Prendergast said a quick-fix cease-fire would not solve the underlying roots of the Congo war, such as greed for minerals and the presence of the Rwandan Hutu Democratic Forces for the Liberation of Rwanda (FDLR) militia.

The FDLR includes in its ranks perpetrators of the 1994 genocide of Tutsis by Hutus in neighbouring Rwanda. Congo accuses Tutsi rebel Nkunda of receiving support from the Tutsi-led Rwandan government of President Paul Kagame.

"The twin issues of Rwanda's war displaced into Congo and the conflict minerals rush remain largely unaddressed," Prendergast said. "It is likely short-term ceasefires can be forged, but in the absence of significant new strategies dealing with FDLR and illicit minerals, the war will remain unresolved."

Congo and Rwanda's governments agreed last week on a plan of operations to disband FDLR fighters in eastern Congo.

Congo's 1998-2003 war sucked in six neighbouring armies and caused more than 5 million deaths.

(Additional reporting by Joe Bavier in Kinshasa; Editing by Pascal Fletcher)

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