President Paul Kagame, alongside fellow leaders from the East African Community (EAC) and the Southern African Development Community (SADC), participated virtually in a high-level summit on August 13, 2025, aimed at accelerating peace efforts in the eastern Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC).
The meeting brought together Heads of State and senior officials from both regional blocs, including President Félix Tshisekedi of the DRC, Dr. William Ruto of Kenya, who chairs the EAC, Emmerson Mnangagwa of Zimbabwe, the SADC Chair, and President Hakainde Hichilema of Zambia.
Also in attendance were Vice President Jessica Alupo of Uganda, Vice President Prosper Bazombanza of Burundi, and the Secretaries-General of EAC and SADC.
Convened as a follow-up to the August 1 consultations in Nairobi, the summit sought to build on earlier agreements between the co-chairs of the Joint EAC–SADC Summit and the African Union (AU) Panel of Facilitators.
Those talks had resolved to merge the separate peace initiatives into a single, coordinated framework, with the goal of creating a more unified approach to ending the long-standing insecurity in eastern DRC.
Among the matters discussed was the formal adoption of outcomes from the earlier Nairobi session, including the consolidation of terms of reference and the operational structure for the AU Mediator and the EAC-SADC Panel of Facilitators.
Leaders also considered the appointment of Botswana’s President Mokgweetsi Masisi to the panel, expanding the mediation team’s capacity.
The summit further reviewed plans to integrate the AU-appointed mediator into the joint EAC-SADC framework and endorsed the proposal to combine the technical secretariats of the AU Commission, EAC, and SADC into a single “Joint Secretariat.”
This unified body, to be led by the AU Commission from its Addis Ababa headquarters, is expected to streamline coordination and reporting mechanisms, with the EAC-SADC Panel jointly reporting to both the regional summit and the AU.
The August 13 meeting reaffirmed the commitment of both regional blocs to sustained dialogue, coordinated action, and institutional alignment as the basis for achieving a lasting resolution to the crisis.
Final resolutions from the summit are set to be announced in the coming days.
