The German parliament approved on Thursday deployment of 780 troops to help secure elections in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC).

In the vote, 440 members of the Bundestag, or the lower house, voted for the development of the troops and 135 voted against it.

The troops will be based only in Congo's capital city of Kinshasa and many other German soldiers will be held as reserve in nearby Gabon.

The United Nations has deployed 17,000 troops in Congo while the European Union will send some 1,500 soldiers dominated by French and German troops.

The Social Democrats and the Christian Democrats, which formed the ruling coalition, both supported sending the troops.

During the debate in the Bundestag, Gert Weisskirchen, a spokesman for the Social Democrats,said the deployment was needed so that Congo could move to a "peaceful economy from one wracked by violence."

However, the opposition Free Democrats (FDP) members criticized the measure, saying that having two separate foreign military missions in Congo will cause confusion.

FDP foreign affairs spokesman Werner Hoyer told parliament his party "doubts the effectiveness of these measures" to deploy German troops.

Source: Xinhua