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File this story in the “I’ll believe it when we see it” category: AP reports that Congolese Lieutenant General John Numbi, chief of staff for the Congo-Rwanda joint military operation against the Rwandan Hutu militia known as the FDLR, claimed yesterday that the operation has “achieved 95 percent of its objectives” and that: A farewell ceremony will take place Feb. 25 or 26 and we are going to escort all the Rwandan troops to the border without any exception. This begs the question, what precisely were the objectives of the anti-FDLR operation? In principle, between 3,000-7,000 Rwandan soldiers entered eastern ...

Zimbabwe’s unity government was less than two days old when police arrested Roy Bennett, a high ranking official from Prime Minister Morgan Tsvangirai’s Movement for Democratic Change, or MDC, on treason and terrorism charges. The arrest of Bennett, the MDC’s nominee for Deputy Agriculture Minister, occurred the day he was to assume his new post, is the latest example of the ZANU-PF’s penchant for prosecuting political opponents, and is yet another indication that Zimbabwe’s fragile new government may already be unraveling. Tsvangirai has been continually demanding for Bennett’s release, calling the arrest “an attempt by hard-liners in (Mugabe’s party, the ...

If you’re wondering what it is like for uprooted Darfuri refugees currently in eastern Chad, check out these recent updates from NBC’s Ann Curry, who is currently reporting from the region. On Tuesday morning, Curry noted that 67,000 refugees in Chad are waiting for the International Criminal Court to issue an arrest warrant for Sudanese President Omar al-Bashir in hopes that it will be the first step in their ability to return to their homes in villages throughout the Darfur region. Curry’s trip coincides with the release of a Human Rights Watch report that documents the Sudanese government’s efforts to ...

With all of the recent news and rumors about the looming International Criminal Court arrest warrant for Sudanese President Omar al-Bashir, you may have missed developments in the landmark International Criminal Court trial of Congolese rebel leader Thomas Lubanga. As you might have read, the trial got off to a very rocky start when the first witness recanted his testimony after appearing shaken by the experience of testifying behind a screen while Lubanga glared at him from several feet away. During the second week of the trial, ICC Chief Prosecutor Luis Moreno-Ocampo told reporters that judges were considering new measures ...

Speaking today to reporters in Cape Town, South Africa, Deng Alor Kuol, Sudan’s foreign minister, called for the International Criminal Court’s case against Sudanese president Omar al-Bashir to be postponed for a year: We are saying we are asking for one year for postponement because this will give us time to work for peace in Darfur which we have already started with one movement, in Darfur we have many movements, more than ten about fifteen… It does not matter if there are fifteen rebel movements or fifty. The Sudanese government does not deserve any more time to “work for peace ...

During Hillary Clinton’s first trip abroad as Secretary of State, the global financial crisis has been the primary topic of conversation and concern in the Secretary’s meetings, receptions, and speeches from Tokyo to Jakarta. In an interview with ABC’s Martha Raddatz in Tokyo, Secretary Clinton agreed with Director of National Intelligence Dennis Blair’s recent assertion that the global financial crisis is the primary security threat facing the United States today: SECRETARY CLINTON: Well, I think what Director Blair was saying, which is a very important point, is we get fixated sometimes on the headlines of dangers. And that is not, ...

Enough’s latest publication, Peace on the Rocks, calls for the United States to reinvigorate efforts to implement the Comprehensive Peace Agreement, or CPA. Given the history of U.S. leadership in brokering this peace deal, the Obama administration and Congress must take important steps to show a renewed American commitment to a lasting peace. Such steps include naming a high-level Special Envoy for Sudan with proper resources to be successful. Enough’s view mirrors that of the United States Commission on International Religious Freedom, which recently released its policy recommendations for Sudan, based in part on testimony from Enough Co-chair John Prendergast ...

Last week, Dennis C. Blair, the new U.S. Director of National Intelligence addressed the Senate Intelligence Committee on the security threats facing the United States. Major papers and sources from around the blogosphere quickly noted that top on Blair’s list of U.S. intelligence concerns was not the al Qaeda terrorist threat, but the global economic crisis. On his new “Aid Watch” blog, noted economist William Easterly was all over Blair, who he derided for his “amateur opinions” on the global financial crisis and who he essentially told to mind his own business (Easterly also managed to squeeze in a potshot ...

A powerful story in today’s New York Times gives a human face to the unimaginable crimes of the Lords Resistance Army, or LRA. In the piece, the Times’ Jeffrey Gettleman focuses on the stories of three people living in the remote town of Faradje in northeastern Congo and narrates how, despite the “terrible mismatch,” communities are doing all they can think of to fight back against Joseph Kony’s “band of experienced killers.” ...

Last weekend, our friends at the Genocide Intervention Network, or GI-NET, launched their Carl Wilkens Fellowship program with a powerful two-day leadership retreat in Washington, D.C. Named after the only American to remain in Rwanda throughout the 1994 genocide, the year-long Carl Wilkens Fellowship trains emerging activist leaders to build political will in their own communities and expand the anti-genocide constituency on a local level. Twenty exceptional individuals from across the United States were chosen to be part of this year's inaugural fellowship class. The diverse class includes an acclaimed genocide scholar, a filmmaker, busy professionals from all walks of ...