The Supreme Court in the Democratic Republic of Congo is set to examine a petition against President Joseph Kabila's candidature in general elections set for later this year.

The United Nations began airdrops of food relief on Wednesday to tens of thousands of people displaced by fighting between the national army and Mayi-Mayi malitiamen in Katanga, the south-eastern province of the Democratic Republic of Congo, a UN official said.

Some 73 presidential candidates have registered for the upcoming elections in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), but the main opposition leader was not among them and the commission has not set a date for the elections.

At least 1,000 residents of two villages in the Democratic Republic of Congo's northeastern district of Ituri sought refuge on Wednesday around a camp of Bangladeshi UN troops following fighting between militiamen and the national army, an official of the UN Mission in the DRC (MONUC) said.

Civic education ahead of elections scheduled for June is of "utmost importance" to sensitise the public for the democratic process, the head of the Democratic Republic of Congo's Independent Electoral Commission, Apollinaire Malumalu, has said.

The Council of the European Union announced on Thursday that it had approved "the concept" of EU troops supporting MONUC, the UN Mission in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) during the presidential and legislative elections process this year.

Thousands of party supporters of veteran opposition politician Etienne Tshisekedi marched through the streets of the Congolese capital, Kinshasa, on Wednesday demanding that their Union pour la democratie et le progres social (UPDS) be integrated into the country's election organisational structures.

United Nations Secretary-General Kofi Annan arrived in Kinshasa, capital of the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), on Tuesday for a three-day visit, on the fourth and final leg of his African tour.

A Congolese warlord, Thomas Lubanga Dyilo, made his first appearance at the International Criminal Court in The Hague on Monday, on charges of conscripting children and using them to participate in hostilities during 2002 and 2003.

Agricultural officials in the Democratic Republic of Congo have recorded at least 260 chickens and ducks suspected of having died of the avian flu, Agriculture Minister Constant Ndom Nda said on Thursday.