The government of the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) said on Friday its army would resist any invasion by foreign forces.

A constitutional referendum for the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) will not be held on 27 October as planned because only about half of the voters have registered so far, the head of the country's electoral commission said on Thursday.

Ugandan President Yoweri Museveni said on Thursday the Congolese government and the UN mission there known as MONUC must, in two months, disarm Lord's Resistance Army (LRA) rebels who recently crossed into eastern Congo or his army would do so.

Some 400 Ugandan rebel Lord's Resistance Army (LRA) who in September crossed from Sudan to the Garamba National Park in northeastern Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) are the latest of several foreign groups which the government says must leave the country by Friday or face serious consequences.

A programme for the delivery of weapons to the secret services in the Democratic Republic of Congo - under a United Nations arms embargo - from the Belgian government of Vallon, and of second-hand guns from Brussels authorities to the police in DR-Congo, was submitted to questioning of the European Commission to establish the legitimacy of the operation.

Uganda has asked the Democratic Republic of Congo to arrest and hand over Lord's Resistance Army (LRA) rebels who are allegedly seeking asylum in the vast central African state, a senior government official said on Monday.

Yesterday delegates from the Congolese government and some representatives of the Ugandan rebel group of the Lord's resistance Army (LRA) met for the first time.

The social problems of the post-war transition in the Democratic republic of Congo were at the heart of the meeting between the president of the Episcopal Conference of Congo (CENCO), monsignor Laurent Monsengwo Pasinya, and the head of state, Joseph Kabila.

Soldiers from the 12th brigade deserted their posts in the east of the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) in the last week, the military spokesman for the UN said on Tuesday, but 580 of them have already returned to base.

The governor of Congo's South Kivu Province, Didas Kaningini, said on Monday that 48 dissident soldiers who were arrested recently as they returned from exile to the east of the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) had escaped from a jail.