Annan heads to Congo as elections loom

UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan travelled to Congo today to meet the president and electoral officials ahead of the war-battered nation’s first election in decades.

Annan is to meet President Joseph Kabila, top officials in charge of arranging the first presidential and legislative elections in 45 years and the head of the UN’s 16,700-troop peace mission overseeing post-war Congo’s transition to democratic rule.