Free trade zone draws closer

Congolese rebels and government agreed on a ceasefire last year

Southern African heads of state are discussing the finalising of arrangements for the setting up of a free trade zone.

The leaders, from the Southern African Development Community, are expected to adopt a protocol which will come into effect next month.

The goal is to establish a free trade area with around $7bn worth of commerce between 11 of the 14 member countries in just over a decade.

A BBC business reporter says a successful free trade zone needs political and economic stability, but recent problems in Zimbabwe and other regional conflicts make the achievement of that goal less certain.

The leaders, who have gathered in the Nambian capital, Windhoek, hope that the new zone will help bring their poeple greater prosperity.

But the outgoing SADC chairman, President Joaquim Chissano of Mozambique, said improvements could come only if creditor nations wrote off what he described as the region's economically debilitating debt.

President Laurent Kabila of the Democratic Republic of Congo is not attending the summit, in a blatant snub to the assembled heads of state who had made the conflict in the DRC one of the major items on the agenda.

His absence has toned down expectations of progress towards a resolution of the civil war in the Democratic Republic of Congo.

President Kabila is staying at home to support his army's efforts

Most of the speeches at the opening session concentrated on SADC's progress towards economic integration.

The organisation is due to launch a free trade zone on 1 September.

However, President Chissano said that the wars in Angola and the DRC were of grave concern.

He did not condemn the warring parties although the leaders of three of those nations were sitting only a few metres away.

Instead he called on the international community to help alleviate the humanitarian suffering of the Angolan and Congolese people.

Zimbabwe

There was no direct reference either to the political and economic turmoil in Zimbabwe.

But President Chissano said it was wrong to characterise those who fought the racist regime of Ian Smith as anti-democratic and dictatorial.

There is a reluctance here to publicly criticise fellow African leaders.

Those concerns are more commonly expressed behind closed doors.