The Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) government officials and M23 rebels fighting in the eastern part of the vast central African country on Friday arrived in the Ugandan capital Kampala for talks aimed at ending the conflict.

The Ugandan government, which is mediating the talks, said on Thursday that the talks were scheduled to kick off on Friday but at the venue of the talks, preparations were just taking place.

High on agenda of the opening talks is setting the ground rules of the talks and who will observe the negotiations.

Alexis Gisaro, one of the Congolese civil society members told Xinhua at the venue of the talks that the most important thing for the Congolese is peace.

He said the warring parties must lay their guys down and dialogue.

"People want peace, they want to be free to go to school, their gardens. What we want for our people is peace and development," he said.

"We must come to a point where all these matters must be talked about peacefully without going to war," he said.

The talks come after the M23 pulled out of Goma, the provincial capital of North Kivu, following a directive from regional leaders.

Uganda has since July been leading regional efforts to end the fighting that has internally displaced over 475,000 people and forced over 75,000 others to flee to neighboring Rwanda and Uganda.