Key Security Council members reached broad agreement on Wednesday on a resolution authorizing an additional 5,900 peacekeeping troops to help Democratic Republic of Congo keep a shaky peace on track. The infusion of fresh troops, which diplomats said had been tentatively endorsed by the United States, Britain and France, would be well below Secretary-General Kofi Annan's call for an extra 13,100 soldiers for the vast central African nation. The council is working against a Friday deadline for renewing the mandate of the overall U.N. mission in Congo, whose current troop ceiling is 10,800. The working draft being negotiated by U.S., British and French experts -- which has not yet been circulated among all 15 council members -- would extend that mandate for an additional six months, giving the council another crack at fixing troop levels next March. Diplomats said there was a consensus that more troops were needed to help Congo's transitional government hold the country together after a five-year civil war that killed more than 3 million people, mostly through disease and hunger. But with demand for peacekeepers soaring and the U.S. government budget drowning in red ink, Washington was pushing for a targeted approach, focusing on Congo's volatile east, along its border with Rwanda, Burundi, Tanzania and Uganda. --More 2125 Local Time 1825 GMT
