WASHINGTON (CNN) -- Vice President Al Gore has pledged close U.S. cooperation and support for South African efforts to defuse a growing Congolese rebellion that could draw Congo and Rwanda into a war.

"We're going to be as helpful as we can and we're going to work together closely to try to assist the people of the Congo," Gore said at a news conference Thursday with South African Deputy President Thabo Mbeki.

South Africa sent three government ministers to Congo for talks today with Congolese President Laurent Kabila, who blames Rwandan soldiers and Tutsi rebels for an uprising in the east of the country. The diplomats will then participate in a Zimbabwe summit of regional leaders Saturday.

Mbeki said they want to see an end to the fighting in Central Africa and development of democracy in the former Zaire, ruled for three decades by Mobutu Sese Seko until Kabila ousted him by force last year.

"Everybody in the region is interested to assist in the process of finding a solution to that conflict," Mbeki said. An important element will be "to try and bring together the various political forces in that country so that they can work together," he added.

Gore said he and Mbeki consulted extensively on the Congo crisis Thursday during the fifth meeting of the U.S.-South Africa Binational Commission and planned to speak again following the weekend meetings.

"We have common objectives and goals," Gore said.

Gore and Mbeki, co-chairmen of the commission, which normally meets every six months, also announced the start of negotiations for a U.S.-South Africa trade agreement. The pact would be the first between the United States and a sub-Saharan African nation.

The panel, which works on issues from business to environment, also launched a law enforcement study group.

The vice president expressed confidence that Congress would approve the stalled African Growth and Opportunity Act, President Clinton's plan to ease tariffs on goods in order to boost U.S. commerce with democratic nations on the continent. "We're pushing for it very hard," Gore said.

Mbeki, who is expected to succeed South African President Nelson Mandela next year, praised the Clinton administration for paying more attention to a part of the world known more for famine, poverty and war.

"I am very pleased with the particular focus he is paying to South Africa and to the African continent, generally," Mbeki said of Clinton, with whom he met Wednesday at the White House.

Mbeki also met Thursday with Treasury Secretary Robert Rubin and Secretary of State Madeleine Albright -- who have both visited South Africa -- and Commerce Secretary William Daley, who goes there next month.

Meanwhile, Kabila vowed Thursday to recover territory captured by the rebels and threatened war against neighboring Rwanda, a former ally that he now accuses of engineering the uprising against him.

"The war will be long and popular ... the whole people of Congo will defend their nation and sovereignty," Kabila said.

"If we do not keep our liberty, we will win it back by war. We will never accept slavery."

Government spokesman Didier Mumenge warned Congo would "extend the war into Rwanda" unless the international community pressures Rwanda to withdraw its troops.

Congo's Justice Minister Mwenze Kongolo also pledged to retaliate against Rwanda.

"This war started in Rwanda and it is going to end in Rwanda," Kongolo said on CNN.

Congo's Tutsi fighters -- known as Banyamulenge -- and Rwandan soldiers, also Tutsis, who played a key role in Kabila's victory over longtime dictator Mobutu Sese Seko last year, are believed to be leading the rebel offense.

Like Kabila's followers who swept across the country from east to west in eight months, the renegades have quickly captured Congo's eastern cities near Rwanda's borders, while moving west through the jungle interior towards Congo's third-largest city, Kisangani.

Rwanda has repeatedly denied involvement in the conflict, but aid workers and other witnesses say they have seen Rwandan troops.

Rebels apparently captured the city of Uvira, south of Bukavu, on Thursday as fighting continued in Kisangani, according to aid workers and rebels.

About 30 Banyamulenge fighters were killed before rebels took Kisangani, said Joseph Mutambo, deputy leader of a rebel-linked political party. However, a government official said Kisangani was firmly in loyalists' hands.

At the opposite end of the country, on Congo's Atlantic coast, gun battles continued in the key oil port of Muanda and nearby Kitona village and military base, 150 miles from the capital, Kinshasa.

Ethnic bitterness at the Banyamulenge and Rwandan Tutsis boiled over in Kinshasa at a demonstration with thousands of protesters.

"Give us weapons to go to Rwanda," demonstrators sang.

The protesters carried two stuffed effigies bearing the images of former leading government officials -- both Tutsis -- who have apparently joined the renegades.

Two goats representing the two were sacrificed at the end of the protest.

Britain urged its citizens Thursday to leave Congo and the United Nations evacuated 77 staff members from Kinshasa. France and the United States had earlier warned citizens to leave.

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