ABSTRACT
The Quaternary kinematic evolution of the north Malawi rift area has been determined from paleostress and paleostrain data, by previous works. The similar results obtained for both the Tanzanian and the Malawian side of Lake Malawi allow to present common horizontal stress trajectories for north Malawi rift and to integrate them in the stress trajectories already proposed for the western branch of the East African rift system and adjacent areas. Therefore, the western branch of the East African rift can also be intergated in the geodynamic context proposed for the eastern branch, in which the East African continent is actually under compressional stress field, dominated by ridge-push from the Red Sea – Gulf of Aden spreading centers.
