Leaders from eastern and southern Africa on Saturday called for an immediate ceasefire in eastern Congo, where rebels are threatening to overthrow the Congolese government, but also urged Congo's president to directly negotiate with them.

Leaders from Eastern and Southern African regional blocs gather in Tanzania on Saturday to seek a solution to the conflict in eastern Congo, where Rwandan-backed rebels have seized a major city in the worst escalation of fighting in more than a decade.

Leaders at an unprecedented joint summit of Eastern and Southern African regional blocs stressed on Saturday the urgency of finding a way out of the crisis in eastern Congo, where Rwanda-backed rebels' rapid advance has fanned fears of a wider war.

As the rebels gained the upper hand in the battlefield by capturing most of Goma - the biggest city in the east - South Africa fired a diplomatic salvo, warning that further attac

Their crisis talks in Tanzania and Equatorial Guinea come as the long-running war escalates.History will judge leaders in Africa who fail to end the conflict in eastern Democratic Republic of Congo, President Samia Suluhu Hassan of Tanzania warned her counterparts at the start of an emergency summit on the weekend.