In the News

One year after Omar al Bashir, the Sudanese president, was indicted for war crimes in the western Darfur region, the violence there continues to linger. Clashes have erupted in the past week despite a ceasefire deal signed last month between the government and a major rebel group.

Enough Project co-founder John Prendergast offers encouragement to the activists braving the cold and holding vigil, for days on end, outside Sen. Tom Coburn’s office in Oklahoma City.

Coming up today we’ll hear about the Conflict in the Congo- in which more than 5 million people have been killed. It’s one of the world’s most under-reported stories… Later we’ll talk with some parenting experts on raising children in a peaceful and productive way…

Early this year, the United Nations sent its favorite dictator-whisperer, Nigerian diplomat Ibrahim Agboola Gambari, to Sudan, hoping to nudge the country's leader and alleged war criminal, President Omar Hassan al-Bashir, toward peace.

A campaign is growing in the United States to end wars and atrocities in eastern Congo by discouraging the export of what organisers describe as "conflict minerals."

With Southern Sudan now believed virtually certain to vote for independence in less than a year, worries are growing in Washington not only over a possible resumption of the North-South civil war, but also over the likelihood that the newly independent state will not prove viable.

My Thursday column is about the war in eastern Congo, looking at the work of Lisa Shannon and her Run for Congo Women. Readers sometimes ask why I often write about outsiders, like Lisa, rather than about the innumerable local people who are doing extraordinary work — often at greater risk. It’s certainly true that Congo, for example, has a vibrant and admirable civil society, full of Congolese women themselves organizing against rape and war.

Five years ago, Lisa Shannon watched “Oprah” and learned about the savage, forgotten war here in eastern Congo, played out in massacres and mass rape. That show transformed Lisa’s life, costing her a good business, a beloved fiancé, and a comfortable home in Portland, Ore. — but giving her a chance to save lives in Congo.

Sudan's U.N. ambassador on Friday dismissed as "irresponsible" U.S. allegations that weapons from northern Sudan were going to armed groups in the semi-autonomous south ahead of a nationwide April election.

The United Nations says the Lord's Resistance Army is continuing to attack civilians in the Democratic Republic of Congo, despite a recent international offensive against the Ugandan rebel group. The Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs says the LRA killed as many as 100 Congolese in January.

President Barack Obama urged Sudan on Monday to cooperate in efforts to stabilize the country or Washington will conclude that engagement is not working and seek "additional pressure" on Khartoum.

The Enough Project's question about Sudan, above, topped the list of questions for President Obama, but his response is unlikely to thrill advocates.

Peace in Sudan remains an uncertainty ahead of the country’s first general elections in 24 years, according to the African Union Commission chief.

With two months to go before the decisive presidential and parliamentary elections, the United Nations (U.N.) and the AU want to ensure that elections take place without an eruption of violence between the north and the south, which can also risk instability in the region.

U.S. President Barack Obama held a town hall meeting Monday using an unusual venue - the YouTube Internet Web site. He took questions submitted via e-mail and video during and following his State of the Union address last week.