Dar es Salaam — British Foreign Secretary David Miliband and French Foreign Minister Bernard Kouchner held talks with President Jakaya Kikwete in Tanzania on Saturday to discuss the deteriorating security situation in the Democratic Republic of Congo.

During the meeting with Mr Kikwete who currently chairs the African Union and France, that holds the European Union chair urged the United Nations to deploy more soldiers in Congo to combat the violence which has seen more than 1.6 million people displaced.

The two officials were in Dar es Salaam as part of their whirlwind diplomacy to galvanise international response to the crisis and find a quick way to halt escalating fighting and prevent a humanitarian catastrophe.

Tanzania's Foreign Affairs and International Cooperation Minister Bernard Membe said after the meeting that the great lakes region countries will hold an emergency meeting this week over the Congo crisis.

In a joint statement, Mr Miliband and Mr Kouchner who earlier visited Kinshasa, Goma and Kigali, said the 17,000 UN peace keeping force on the ground was not enough to respond to the crisis.

"The situation in Congo is becoming worse as more than 1.6 million are internally displaced and need humanitarian assistance to avoid the 1994 genocide," said Miliband in reference to the Rwandan civil war that cost the lives of nearly a million people.

More than 250,000 people are thought to have fled their homes in recent weeks following a clash between government forces and soldiers loyal to rebel leader Laurent Nkunda.

He asked both sides to return to promises made in a peace agreements signed in 2007 and early 2008 in Nairobi, Kenya, and Goma, capital of North Kivu province.

Meanwhile, A United Nations aid convoy escorted by UN peacekeepers crossed into a rebel-held zone of eastern Congo yesterday on a mission to help tens of thousands of civilians displaced by fighting.

The convoy of a dozen all-terrain vehicles and two truckloads of UN peacekeepers rolled through the front line separating Congolese army troops and Tutsi rebels, whose offensive last week triggered a humanitarian emergency.