(Adds candidates' meeting, paragraph 6) By David Lewis KINSHASA, Nov 7 (Reuters) - U.N. and European peacekeepers have bolstered their presence on the streets of Congo's capital Kinshasa to stem any violence as results trickle in from a presidential run-off vote. U.N. blue helmets are dug in with heavy weapons behind sandbagged positions while EU soldiers have stepped up foot and vehicle patrols through the teeming capital, a crumbling home to some 8 million people. The Oct. 29 vote between President Joseph Kabila and Vice-President Jean-Pierre Bemba was the last stage in a long and costly peace process meant to draw a line under Congo's last war, which sparked a humanitarian crisis that has killed 4 million people. With provisional results due next week, tensions are high in a city where Bemba, a former rebel, has a commanding support base and many accuse the incumbent president and favourite of being a foreign-backed stooge. Memories are fresh from August, when initial first-round results were greeted by street battles. With 2 million ballots counted, Kabila held nearly 70 percent of the vote, but diplomats said it was too early to predict anything from that. Amid intense international pressure for both sides to accept the results peacefully, Kabila held a rare meeting with Bemba at the presidential palace on Tuesday. A joint-statement was due to be released later, the vice-president told reporters as he left. "Are these elections or is this war?" asked one pedestrian as heavily-armed Spanish soldiers got out of their Humvees and walked through Kinshasa's rubbish-strewn streets. The soldiers' attempts to convince passers-by they were neutral and would protect civilians if fighting started between Bemba and Kabila's private armies seemed to fall on deaf ears. "When we see the soldiers, we fear war," Alex Bolombo said above music blaring out of the Libulu ya Metro bar. "We have already chosen Bemba as our president. Let the results of the vote speak ... Congo is for the Congolese and we are ready to die for this," Bolombo said. ETHNIC DIVIDE Congo's vote has been largely ethnic and highly divisive. The west of the vast country is a Bemba heartland, where most speak Lingala and view Kabila as a foreigner because of his upbringing in neighbouring countries and the fact he is from the Swahili-speaking east, which voted massively for him. There are over 1,000 UN peacekeepers in the capital and the EU has tripled its number of combat troops to about 300 over the last few weeks. "We have restarted our patrols and we have intensified them to highlight our presence," said Lt.-Col. Thierry Fusalba, spokesman for the EU Force in Congo. "It ... reassures the population. It also serves as dissuasion against those who might challenge the democratic process through violence." Since the August fighting, both Bemba and Kabila's camps have promised to limit the movements of their soldiers and launch any challenge of the results through democratic means. But there are widespread reports that both have been rearming. "Despite the vote, I'm not yet reassured," said Edmund Muhiana, an elderly man trying to walk between battered Volkswagen minibuses and the Spanish fighting vehicles. "These soldiers are here but we still don't really know what they are here for. How do we know they have not come to impose one of these people on us?" he said.
