By Evelyn Leopold
New York - The United Nations security council, responding to demands from African presidents for troops in the Democratic Republic of Congo, is promising to move quickly in authorising military observers, but has not committed itself to a full-fledged force.
UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan has recommended 5 000 troops and military support personnel to protect 500 unarmed military observers in the DRC, thereby laying the groundwork for a possible larger force.
On Wednesday, the council said it had begun "consideration of a resolution authorising the expansion of United Nations personnel" and "expresses its intention to act promptly".
It also said the 15-member body would "consider at the appropriate time preparations for an additional phase of the United Nations deployment and further action".
Diplomats said the United States was far from approving peacekeepers and even the promised resolution on the observer force would have to wait about two weeks until the White House received approval from a reluctant congress.
Plea by seven African leaders
The council's move was a gesture of support after seven African heads of state, including those involved in Congo's civil war, insisted the UN send peacekeepers to shore up a faltering ceasefire pact.
The presidents - from Congo, Uganda, Rwanda, Zambia, Zimbabwe, Angola and Mozambique - pledged at an extraordinary security council meeting on Monday to bolster the accord, signed last summer in Lusaka, Zambia. But they all said it would fail without peacekeepers.
The African presidents were invited to New York by United States ambassador Richard Holbrooke, this month's council president, but he said he did not expect immediate results.
Wednesday's security council move also warned that approval of military observers did not necessarily mean they would be dispatched until security and access was guaranteed.
Troops from Zimbabwe, Angola and Namibia have entered the Congo's civil war, which began in 1998, in support of the government of President Laurent Kabila against rebels backed by Uganda and Rwanda.
The governments involved signed an accord in Lusaka in July 1999 and rebel leaders joined the agreement in August. But fighting has continued in the war, which has destabilised central Africa and driven a million people from their homes.
The Lusaka accord, the implementation of which has fallen behind schedule, called for the withdrawal of foreign troops in Congo and a UN peacekeeping force to enforce the pact.
The African leaders met United States and United Nations officials as well as each other this week, despite obvious acrimony between Congo's Kabila and the presidents of Rwanda and Uganda. They have also been entertained daily by United States politicians and businessmen.
Maurice Templesman, who has extensive mining interests in Africa and is chair of the Washington-based Corporate Council on Africa, hosted a dinner on Tuesday that included Kabila, Presidents Yoweri Museveni of Uganda, Robert Mugabe of Zimbabwe, Jose Eduardo dos Santos of Angola, Frederick Chiluba of Zambia and Joaquim Chissano of Mozambique, who was the keynote speaker.
James Harmon, head of the United States Export-Import Bank, told guests, including executives from Amoco, Chevron and other investors in Africa, that the United States "desperately wants to build a relationship with Africa".
The bank provides credits and loan guarantees for American corporations investing oversees. But The United Nations says foreign investment in Africa from all countries fell more than 11 percent in 1998. - Reuters