Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu met on Thursday with President Felix Tshisekedi of the Democratic Republic of the Congo on the sidelines of the UN General Assembly in New York.
The two leaders discussed strengthening cooperation between the countries in the fields of agriculture, trade, defense, cyber and more.
During the meeting, Netanyahu and Tshisekedi announced that Israel would open an embassy in Kinshasa, and Congo would move its embassy to Jerusalem.
Prime Minister Netanyahu said, "We just had very productive talks with the President of Congo, and we agreed that Israel will open an embassy in Kinshasa and Congo will move its embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem - these are two good announcements and I think they reflect our common desire to upgrade our relations."
President Tshisekedi said, "I confirm that we had excellent discussions with the Prime Minister of Israel Netanyahu. The discussions covered our excellent relations and how to reinforce those relations. Those discussions also covered the way we could come closer to Israel by developing more projects in investment, in security, in cyber security and so on."
"In order to emphasize this, the State of Israel has agreed to open its embassy in Kinshasa, and on the other hand, the Democratic Republic of the Congo agreed to move its embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem," added the Congolese President.
“God bless the relationship between Israel and the Democratic Republic of Congo,” he concluded.
In 2021, Tshisekedi met with then-Prime Minister Naftali Bennett and announced that his country will open a diplomatic mission in Israel’s capital.
At the time, he did not discuss the opening of an embassy in Israel’s capital, but added that the new mission would also work to increase economic ties between the two countries.
In recent years, several countries have relocated their embassies to Jerusalem and other countries have mulled the idea of following in the steps of the US and doing the same.
Earlier this month, Papua New Guinea dedicated its new embassy in Jerusalem.
Last year, Suriname’s Foreign Minister, Albert Ramchand Ramdin, announced that the South American country would open an embassy in Israel’s capital city. However, the move was later reversed due to budgetary reasons.
In March it was reported that Hungary would relocate its embassy to Jerusalem. Hungarian President Katalin Novak later said that no decision had yet been made on the issue.
Foreign Minister Eli Cohen said in May that he is "optimistic" that three more embassies would open in Jerusalem.
In August, Cohen met with Paraguayan President Santiago Peña, and the two agreed that Paraguay will open an embassy in Jerusalem in the coming months.