THE Southern African Development Committee (SADC) is set to hold another extraordinary summit in Harare, Thursday to discuss the security situation in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC).
This comes after President Emmerson Mnangagwa who is also the SADC chairman vowed to take action against those responsible for attacks on UN and SADC peacekeepers in eastern DRC.
At least 13 soldiers with peacekeeping forces in DRC were killed in clashes with the March 23 Movement (M23) rebels and over 400,000 people displaced since the beginning of the year.
The M23, one of around 100 armed groups fighting for control in the mineral-rich region, briefly seized Goma in 2012 and reemerged in late 2021 with alleged support from Rwanda, according to the Congolese government and UN experts.
"The Southern African Development Community (SADC) will convene an Extraordinary Summit of Heads of State and Government on 30th of January 2025 in Harare, Republic of Zimbabwe, to discuss the security situation in the eastern part of the Democratic Republic of Congo.
"The Summit will be chaired by His Excellency Dr. Emmerson Dambudzo Mnangagwa, President of the Republic of Zimbabwe, and Chairperson of SADC.
"The Summit follows the outcome of the Extraordinary Summit of the SADC Organ Troika plus the DRC and Troop Contributing Countries (TCCs) to the SADC Mission in the DRC (SAMIDRC), which was held on 28th January 2025 and was chaired by Her Excellency Dr. Samia Suluhu Hassan, the President of the United Republic of Tanzania and Chairperson of the SADC Organ on Politics Defence and Security Cooperation.
"The Extraordinary Summit will be preceded by the meetings of the SADC Standing Committee of Senior Officials and the SADC Council of Ministers," the SADC Secretariat said in a statement Wednesday.
Meanwhile, SADC recently held another extraordinary summit in November 2024 to discuss Mozambique and Botswana elections after having hosted the 44th SADC summit in August 2024 where Mnangagwa assumed the regional bloc's rotational chairmanship.