FRANTIC efforts to stage toplevel negotiations to avert civil war reaching Kinshasa, the capital of Zaire, suffered a setback yesterday when rebels demanded the unconditional surrender of President Mobutu Sese Seko.
The rebel leader, Mr Laurent Desire Kabila, hardened his tone over planned face to face talks with Mr Mobutu, saying he would only attend a short ceremony on the transfer of power.
Mr Kabila returned on Thursday to Zaire from exploratory talks in South Africa that raised hopes for a negotiated deal to halt six months of civil war.
Yesterday he stated by telephone from Zaire's second city, Lubumbashi, that his forces would march on Kinshasa if Mr Mobutu declined to give up power.
"The South African initiative is about transfer of power. When he is ready for this, I shall go and attend a short day's ceremony on the peaceful transfer of power," he said.
"There will be no protracted negotiations with Mobutu, never, never. Maybe we have been misunderstood. The issue is about transfer of power, otherwise we march on to Kinshasa," Mr Kabila added.
But Mr Mobutu's security aide and head of Kinshasa's negotiating team in South Africa, Mr Honore Ngbanda, said Mr Mobutu yesterday accepted President Nelson Mandela's invitation for talks with Mr Kabila, which would be held "as soon as possible".
"This morning I gave officially this invitation of President Mandela to President Mobutu and he accepted. .. but the practical details are being studied," he said.
Mr Ngbanda said the meeting would deal with transitional arrangements, which Mr Mobutu's camp insists must focus on elections to determine if Zaireans want Mr Mobutu or not.
But the rebel foreign minister, Mr Bizima Karaha, in separate comments yesterday, ruled out any notion of such transitional arrangements by repeating that there would be no truce in the civil war until Mr Mobutu left office without preconditions.
Mr Karaha said talk that pending negotiations would deal with some form of transitional powersharing was incorrect. "What we are negotiating is the mode of departure of Mobutu... The modalities for the end of the dictatorial regime."
Military sources said Mr Kabila's forces - already in control of half of Zaire - appeared to be building up for an assault on Kinshasa.
The hardline rebel statements and startling allegations of a massacre plot stoked anxiety in Kinshasa.
Mr Kabila accused Mr Mobutu through an aide of ordering the massacre of all expatriates in Kinshasa to provoke the intervention of the troops in Congo and avert his downfall. In a statement to reporters in Lubumbashi, Mr Kabila said the alleged plot could "start at any minute".
Mr Mobutu's son and spokesman, Mr Nzanga Mobutu, dismissed the allegation as "ridiculous nonsense".
US officials said yesterday they were discounting claims by Zairean rebels that President Mobutu had ordered the massacre of all expatriates in Kinshasa.
"Give it no credence. We're discounting it," he added.