African lawmakers from the Great Lakes region would meet next week in Kinshasa, capital of the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), to review the regional pacts on security and peace which were signed last December in Kenya, officials said on Friday.

A statement from the newly-established Great Lakes Region Conference Secretariat said lawmakers from eleven countries will look at ways to speed up the implementation of the Pact on Security, Stability and Development which was signed on Dec. 15 in the Kenyan capital Nairobi.

"The meeting will provide an opportunity for the parliamentarians to be well informed about the process as well as to ponder on ways and means to speed up the ratification of the Pact which is made up of the Dar es Salaam Declaration, Programs of Action, Protocols and the Regional Follow-Up Mechanism and therefore enabling its rapid implementation," the statement said.

"As lawmakers, the parliamentarians are expected to map out strategies for their involvement in the implementation of the Pact, thus strengthening the ownership of the process," it said.

The Kinshasa rendezvous is the first high-level meeting since the signing of the Pact which ushered in a new phase of the process last December.

Lawmakers will come from Angola, Burundi, the Central African Republic, the Republic of Congo, the Democratic Republic of Congo, Kenya, Rwanda, Sudan, Tanzania, Uganda and Zambia.

Joining the Great Lakes region lawmakers as observers will be their counterparts from the Southern African Development Community, the East African Legislative Assembly, the Central African Women Parliamentarians Network, the Pan African Parliament and representatives of some European countries' parliaments.

The Pact on Security, Stability and Development in the Great Lakes region includes 33 concrete and achievable projects in the fields of peace and security, democracy and good governance, economic development and regional integration, and humanitarian and social issues.

It also has ten protocols that will establish a new legal framework among the member states.

Source: Xinhua