Luanda — Angolan head of state, João Lourenço, held a telephone conversation on Wednesday with his Rwanda counterpart Paul Kagame, according to a note from the Presidency of the Republic to which ANGOP had access.

The note of the Press Secretariat of the Presidential Palace says that the two leaders addressed "bilateral and regional issues".

This is the second telephone contact that President João Lourenço has had, on the same day, after speaking, hours earlier, with his counterpart from the Republic of the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), Félix Antoine Tshisekedi.

In this first contact, the two statesmen also reviewed the state of bilateral relations as well as issues on the regional agenda, according to the same source.

The conversation takes place a few days after Tshisekedi's inauguration for a new five-year term as head of the Congolese State, in a ceremony attended by President João Lourenço alongside other African leaders.

The ceremony took place on January 20th in Kinshasa, following Tshisekedi's re-election in last December's elections, which he won with more than 73% of the votes.

The DRC and Rwanda are two neighboring countries that are experiencing moments of diplomatic tension, since the resurgence of the March 23 Movement (M23) rebellion at the end of 2021, allegedly with the support of Kigali, according to Kinshasa.

The Angolan head of state was mandated by the African Union (AU) to intervene as a mediator in the search for solutions to end the conflict in the DRC and help the two neighboring countries to normalize their diplomatic relations. IZ/DOJ