After talks in Switzerland, the two sides also made progress on a protocol for ceasefire oversight.<\/em><\/p>\n<\/div>\n Published On 19 Apr 2026<\/span>19 Apr 2026<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n The government of the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) and rival M23 rebels have agreed to ease aid deliveries and release prisoners, as mediators push to resolve a years-long conflict that has persisted despite multiple peace deals.<\/p>\n The two sides announced the measures in a joint statement shared by the US Department of State on Saturday, following five days of talks in Switzerland.<\/p>\n list of 3 items<\/span>end of list<\/span><\/section>\n \u201cThe parties agreed to refrain from any action that would undermine the principled delivery of humanitarian assistance within the territories impacted by the conflict,\u201d said the statement.<\/p>\n Both sides also pledged not to target civilians and to facilitate medical care for the wounded and sick as they noted progress on a protocol for humanitarian access and judicial protections.<\/p>\n They agreed to release prisoners within 10 days as part of efforts \u201cto continue building confidence\u201d.<\/p>\n In addition, the parties signed a memorandum of understanding for a ceasefire monitoring mechanism that will \u201cbegin conducting surveillance, monitoring, verification, and reporting on the implementation of the permanent ceasefire between the parties\u201d.<\/p>\n Since 2021, the M23, backed by Rwanda, has seized territory in eastern DRC, a region ravaged by more than 30 years of conflict.<\/p>\n While the two sides signed a United States-brokered peace agreement in December, fighting has continued, most recently reaching the highland areas of South Kivu, according to media reports.<\/p>\n In a statement last week, Human Rights Watch accused the parties of blocking aid deliveries and stopping civilians from fleeing the South Kivu highlands.<\/p>\n \u201cCivilians in South Kivu\u2019s highlands are facing a dire humanitarian crisis and live in fear of abuses by all parties,\u201d said Clementine de Montjoye, senior Great Lakes researcher at Human Rights Watch.<\/p>\n The latest round of talks, held in the Swiss Riviera town of Montreux, included representatives from Qatar, the US, Switzerland, the African Union (AU) Commission, and Togo serving as the AU mediator.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n After talks in Switzerland, the two sides also made progress on a protocol for ceasefire oversight. Published On 19 Apr 202619 Apr 2026 The government of the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) and rival M23 rebels have agreed to ease aid deliveries and release prisoners, as mediators push to resolve a years-long conflict that […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":19535,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-19534","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-africa-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/inernews.online\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19534","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/inernews.online\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/inernews.online\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inernews.online\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inernews.online\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=19534"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/inernews.online\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19534\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inernews.online\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/19535"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/inernews.online\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=19534"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inernews.online\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=19534"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inernews.online\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=19534"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![](\"https:\/\/www.aljazeera.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/05\/2017-06-08T131939Z_1189275883_RC11B0FE7F20_RTRMADP_3_GULF-QATAR-JAZEERA-1714943623.jpg?resize=96%2C96&quality=80)
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