The Security Council on Congo’s warring sides have agreed to a new timetable for the factions to begin pulling back their troops and for U.N. observers to move in to oversee their departure. A resolution with the new blueprint is expected to be adopted today at the conclusion of a two-day meeting between the council, ministers of the six warring countries and representatives of Congo’s three main rebel groups involved in the conflict. Hopes for peace have been raised by recent pledges by Rwanda and Uganda to withdraw troops from Congolese territory. In addition, Congo’s new president, Joseph Kabila, has agreed to meet with a regional mediator to launch talks with the country’s internal opposition — a key provision of the 1999 ceasefire agreement that his slain father had refused to fulfill.