CORRESPONDENTS

Alan Boswell

Civil war still rages in Nuba Mountains, thwarting Sudan, South Sudan peace

Four months ago, U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton was widely praised for helping to orchestrate an agreement between Sudan and South Sudan that everyone said would help halt the economic implosion of both countries, then locked in a standoff over what share Sudan should have in oil produced in South Sudan. | 01/07/13 16:32:10 By - By Alan Boswell

Africa says it’s ready to conduct own missions – with West’s money

When M23 rebels marched on the eastern Congolese city of Goma last month, the United Nations’ largest peacekeeping mission at first struck back like a force that costs $1.4 billion a year, pounding the advancing columns from the air. But as the Congolese army quickly dissolved, so did the U.N. resistance, and days later the rebels rolled into Goma with barely a fight. | 12/19/12 13:32:20 By - By Alan Boswell

Visit to Kismayo, Somalia, shows al Shabab militants still roam countryside

On the four-mile stretch of paved road between the Kenyan army’s main base and the southern Somali city of Kismayo, a man leading a donkey cart whispered a short warning in the local Somali language as a fleet of Kenyan troops and allied Somali militiamen rolled past. | 12/06/12 16:12:14 By - By Mohammed Yusuf and Alan Boswell

Military action against al Qaida-linked extremists in Mali unlikely for months

Six months after al Qaida-affiliated militants took control of Timbuktu in northern Mali, evidence is mounting that plans for an international effort to prevent the desert region from becoming a new terrorist haven are facing steep challenges and that no military operation against the extremists is likely for a year or more. | 11/29/12 18:38:54 By - By Alan Boswell

Fall of Goma in eastern Congo raises fears of wider war

The Congolese army fled and United Nations peacekeepers watched paralyzed as Rwandan-linked rebels wrapped up a stunning five-day offensive Tuesday by strolling into one of the Democratic Republic of Congo’s most important cities, Goma, sending shock waves through troubled central Africa. | 11/20/12 18:54:24 By - By Alan Boswell

West Africa approves sending 3,300 troops to battle militants in Mali

Earlier this summer, Mali’s Islamist militant northern rebels abandoned their southernmost position, the town of Douentza, some 100 miles northeast up the road from Mopti, where the Malian army had retreated this spring after being routed out of the northern two-thirds of the country. | 11/12/12 17:10:53 By - By Alan Boswell

Mali militant affiliated with al Qaida easy to track

A researcher on security in West Africa said the al Qaida-linked leadership in charge of northern Mali appeared unconcerned at the moment about being tracked. | 11/01/12 18:15:52 By - By Alan Boswell

Al Qaida-linked groups cement control in northern Mali as diplomats ponder intervention

Not long ago, this green oasis was a bustling tourist destination. Now it’s the would-be jumping off point for the world’s newest battle against Islamist extremism. | 10/31/12 15:58:54 By - By Alan Boswell

Hunger stalks refugees despite oil deal between Sudan, South Sudan

On Aug. 13, Kuwa Hassan’s mother carried him to the German Emergency Doctors Hospital in a rebel-held area of Sudan. Four years old, Kuwa was feverish – suffering from diarrhea – and he weighed less than 16 pounds. He was barely alive. | 10/09/12 16:08:40 By - By Alan Boswell

Kenyan-Somali forces launch assault on al Qaida in Somalia

Kenyan and Somali forces on Friday launched their long-awaited assault on Kismayo, the southern Somali seaport stronghold of the rebel group al Shabab – Somalia’s al Qaida chapter – but even if the key city is eventually captured, stability in the restless area may not soon follow. | 09/28/12 16:56:02 By - By Alan Boswell

Sudan, South Sudan sign deal to ease tension on border

Arch foe neighbors Sudan and South Sudan signed 10 "cooperation" agreements on Thursday meant to demilitarize the tense border, re-start oil production and open a new page after decades of war and last year’s contentious split into two separate nations. Yet several of the hottest disputes were put off for later talks, signaling that one of the world’s most intractable conflicts still could flare up. | 09/27/12 18:56:09 By - By Alan Boswell

Four Somali journalists die in two days of attacks in Mogadishu

Four Somali journalists have been killed in the last two days in Mogadishu, the capital of Somalia, in what appears to be a campaign of assassination by unknown assailants. | 09/21/12 18:00:47 By - By Alan Boswell

New Somali president, Hassan Sheikh Mohamud, unharmed as suicide attack kills 8

Somalia’s new president, Hassan Sheikh Mohamud, a longtime academic and political activist, boasted during a June interview with McClatchy that he’d lived in Mogadishu – sometimes referred to as the world’s most dangerous city – for 22 years without a security detail. Now that he’s the president, that will have to change. | 09/12/12 17:51:53 By - By Alan Boswell and Abdi Ibrahim

Long-troubled Somalia selects a new president in surprising parliamentary vote

A trained mechanical engineer and academic who prided himself on living in the world’s most dangerous city for 22 years without the luxury of a security detail has been selected as the new president of Somalia, perhaps the world’s most notoriously troubled nation. | 09/10/12 23:06:00 By - By Alan Boswell

South Sudanese rapper Emmanuel Jal says police beat him

South Sudanese hip-hop artist Emmanuel Jal, a global peace activist who’s the subject of the book and movie "War Child," said Monday that he was brutally beaten and knocked unconscious over the weekend by police in South Sudan’s capital, Juba, as he was planning a peace concert. | 09/10/12 18:35:44 By - By Alan Boswell

Kenya church attacks are latest sign of tension between Christians, Muslims

Kenya is predominantly Christian and the relationship between that majority and the sizable Muslim minority has been mostly friendly. But that veneer of tolerance was ripped open last week. | 09/06/12 16:40:34 By - By Alan Boswell

Mabior Garang, son of South Sudan’s founder, blasts country’s leadership

In a move that’s likely to shake the foundations of the world’s youngest nation, the eldest son of South Sudan’s founding hero has broken his family’s political silence and declared his opposition to the country’s leadership. | 08/31/12 16:29:10 By - By Alan Boswell

Al Shabab flees Somali port of Merca ahead of African Union troops

African Union and Somali soldiers captured another key town from Somalia’s al Qaida affiliate Monday, seizing the fishing port of Merca and boxing in the Islamist rebels even further in a steady military campaign aimed at capturing their last major stronghold, the port of Kismayo. | 08/27/12 18:17:07 By - By Alan Boswell and Abdi Ibrahim

Ethiopians talk about their deceased leader – anonymously, that is

The fear that grips Ethiopian society – and, some say, keeps the country’s ruling party in power – was painfully obvious in the wake of Meles Zenawi’s death in Brussels late Monday. People out on the street did not feel comfortable talking about the man who had ruled their nation for 21 years. | 08/22/12 16:08:07 By - By Alan Boswell

Death of Ethiopia’s Meles Zenawi likely to affect conflicts in Somalia, Sudan

Ethiopian leader Meles Zenawi, who during 21 years of repressive rule transformed his nation into a regional powerhouse, has died of an unspecified illness, depriving the United States of a key ally in the battle against al Qaida-affiliated rebels in Somalia. | 08/21/12 18:35:50 By - By Alan Boswell

American expelled from South Sudan for anti-corruption work

The letter was as bold as it was explosive. Signed by the South Sudanese president and sent out with a news release, it chastised its powerful recipients for collectively stealing $4 billion from the world’s newest country, before it was even born. | 08/20/12 18:59:59 By - By Alan Boswell

East Africa debates what happens to southern Somalia if al Shabab is routed

A long-awaited assault on the southern Somali port of Kismayo that Western governments hope will end the influence of al Qaida’s branch in Somalia has been delayed over last-minute negotiations on how to divide the spoils and avoid more civil war should the city fall. | 08/14/12 15:57:52 By - By Alan Boswell and Abdi Ibrahim

Clinton given credit for pushing Sudan, South Sudan to resolve oil fee dispute

Bitter African foes Sudan and South Sudan reported Saturday that they had struck a deal that would let South Sudan re-start oil production and ship it through Sudan for a fee. U.S. officials hailed the accord, but it remained unclear when, or even if, oil will start flowing. | 08/04/12 18:18:58 By - By Alan Boswell

Apparent attack on soldiers fails as Kenya prepares for Hillary Clinton

On the eve of Secretary of State Hillary Clinton’s arrival in Nairobi, a man blew himself up Friday apparently while trying to toss a grenade at Kenyan soldiers in a Muslim district of the capital, highlighting the growing threat of violent Islamism in the region even as Somalia’s al Shabab group is losing ground nearby. | 08/03/12 17:45:50 By - By Alan Boswell and Mohammed Yusuf

Clinton visit to South Sudan colored by accusations its president lied to Obama

On Friday, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton will become the most senior U.S. official to visit South Sudan since its birth last summer, a visit that comes after a troubled year of relations aggravated by the fact that U.S. officials believe South Sudan’s president personally lied to President Barack Obama on several occasions. | 08/02/12 14:53:24 By - By Alan Boswell

Turks provide aid in Mogadishu, Somalia, where others fear to tread

On the edge of Somalia’s battered capital of Mogadishu, on a hilltop overlooking the Indian Ocean, there’s an unlikely oasis of white tents laid out in perfect rows, where foreigners mingle with locals, a bakery provides free fresh bread daily and even the sandy floors are swept. Flapping audaciously in the seaside breeze above it all is the symbol of Mogadishu’s newest foreign patron, the red and white flag of Turkey. | 07/31/12 16:58:41 By - By Alan Boswell

U.S. not probing allegations of massive South Sudanese corruption

The State Department isn’t considering slapping travel bans on South Sudanese officials despite revelations that the former rebel party that the United States backed in its independence bid has stolen billions of dollars from oil revenues meant to rebuild the country, U.S. officials have told McClatchy. | 07/26/12 18:54:45 By - By Alan Boswell

As South Sudan marks 1st year, wars rage on its doorstep

In Sudan, hundreds of thousands of people are starving to death and fleeing their homes in war-torn border lands whose names are unknown to most outsiders. | 07/11/12 13:05:46 By - By Alan Boswell

Thousands flee Sudanese army’s scorched-earth military campaign

In interviews this week, refugees who’ve made it to South Sudan described a Sudanese military offensive that began in May and has driven at least 40,000 people from their villages. The refugees report that their villages have been burned and their neighbors and family members hunted down and killed. Others died on the long walk to South Sudan. | 06/21/12 19:39:20 By - By Alan Boswell

South Sudan, still in infancy, already a global problem child

The years-long U.S. effort to bring peace to central Africa is foundering as the continent’s newest country proves to be something other than the peace-loving creation that had been hoped for. War seems closer than at any other time since the 2005 peace agreement that U.S. diplomats brokered to end fighting between Sudan’s government in Khartoum and the rebels that became the rulers of South Sudan. | 06/13/12 16:29:00 By - By Alan Boswell

Al Qaida’s al Shabab may be on last legs in Somalia after key military defeats

With the recent loss of two key transit points, al Qaida’s Somali affiliate, for the first time in years, is facing what military analysts say is the likely end of the group’s once-powerful rule over much of Somalia | 06/01/12 19:34:34 By - By Alan Boswell and Mohammed Yusuf

Kenya bombards Shabab-held Kismayo in Somalia, renews long-delayed attack on al Qaida affiliate

Kenya has renewed its long-stalled offensive against al Qaida’s affiliate in Somalia, just days after the Kenyan government blamed the Somali Islamists for an apparent terrorist attack in downtown Nairobi. | 05/30/12 19:11:48 By - By Alan Boswell and Mohammed Yusuf McClatchy Newspapers

Kenya blast thought to be work of Somalia’s al Qaida-linked Shabab insurgents

A blast that blew the roof off a downtown building and hurled shards of glass and burned clothing into the streets on Monday apparently was the strongest retaliation yet by al Qaida-linked forces in Somalia for Kenya’s military foray into that country. | 05/28/12 19:12:56 By - By Alan Boswell

Sudan's Bashir, in Heglig, vows no peace talks as jets hit Bentiu in South Sudan

Sudanese war jets launched four missiles into this key South Sudanese state capital Monday, killing at least one and wounding 10 others as tensions continued to rise along the disputed South Sudan-Sudan border. | 04/23/12 00:00:00 By - By Alan Boswell

Sudan launches major attack on South Sudan

Sudanese forces launched a major attack along the border with South Sudan after the South Sudanese army withdrew from a disputed oil field on Friday, signaling that the recent border war between the two countries is not yet over and might be entering a new phase. | 04/22/12 00:00:00 By - By Alan Boswell

South Sudan, reeling from Sudan counterattack, says it will withdraw from Heglig

South Sudan announced Friday that it will pull its forces from the disputed border territory of Heglig, a move that from the ground appeared more like a retreat intended to cover up a military thrashing at the hands of a Sudanese counterattack. | 04/20/12 20:22:25 By - Alan Boswell

U.S. envoy: South Sudan’s capture of Heglig went “beyond self-defense”

The seizure by South Sudan troops of an oil town inside Sudan has put Washington in a difficult position. U.S. policy has long favored South Sudan over Sudan, partly in response to a pro-South Sudan lobby in the U.S. that sees South Sudanese as victims of Sudan’s northern, Arab elites. But special envoy Princeton Lyman said South Sudan’s capture of Heglig went “beyond self-defense.” | 04/18/12 00:00:00 By - By Alan Boswell

Amid a trail of corpses, little doubt that Sudan, South Sudan are now at war

Nine months after Sudan split into two nations in search of a peace brokered by the United States, it is now clear that the two sides are at war. | 04/16/12 00:00:00 By - By Alan Boswell

Sudan bombards Bentiu as clashes with South Sudan escalate

Sudanese war planes on Saturday bombed a key state capital in South Sudan for the second time in three days in the latest escalation of a border conflict that has pushed the two old foes the closest that they've been in years to all-out war. | 04/14/12 15:45:00 By - Alan Boswell

In Sudan's Nuba Mountains, rebels roll up string of victories

The war between the rebels in Sudan's Nuba Mountains — most of them African Christians or animists — and the Arab Muslim government of Sudanese President Omar al Bashir in Khartoum has raged for decades. Hundreds of thousand have died, and Sudan's South Kordofan state is a humanitarian wasteland, where aerial bombing by government planes has driven thousands of villagers into the countryside. | 04/12/12 16:28:00 By - Alan Boswell

Sudan sends warplanes over South Sudan as border conflict rages

Sudan sent military aircraft over a key South Sudanese city Tuesday as part of a two-day bombing campaign that has targeted South Sudanese military positions along the two nations' disputed border. | 03/27/12 16:59:00 By - Alan Boswell

Major oil reserve tapped in remote northern Kenya

Kenya soon could join the ranks of oil-producing countries after the president and oil companies announced Monday that a major oil find had been discovered in the country's arid, remote north. | 03/26/12 18:34:00 By - Alan Boswell

Leader of Mali military coup received U.S. training

The leader of the military coup that toppled the democratic government of the West African nation of Mali this week underwent basic officer training in the United States, the Obama administration acknowledged Friday. | 03/23/12 17:02:00 By - Alan Boswell

Military grabs power in Africa's Mali as Libya fallout spreads

In the latest unforeseen consequence of the toppling of Moammar Gadhafi in Libya, a barracks mutiny turned into a full-fledged military power grab in the West African nation of Mali on Thursday, replacing an elderly, well-regarded statesman with a cadre of unknown junior officers. | 03/22/12 17:45:00 By - Alan Boswell

In a first, international court convicts Congo rebel leader

Nearly 10 years after opening its doors as a bold attempt at a global justice system, the International Criminal Court has reached its first verdict, finding a Congolese rebel leader guilty Wednesday of using child soldiers in violation of international law. | 03/14/12 17:53:00 By - Alan Boswell

In South Sudan's violence, U.S.-backed army part of the problem

Martha Meroi escaped one nightmare only to fall straight into another. Fleeing a column of 10,000 enemies in South Sudan's tribal wars, Meroi, eight months pregnant, and her family darted across the parched wilderness for four days before rival militiamen caught up and pinned them against a riverbank. Children were bludgeoned, and old men hacked to bits. The air was alive with bullets and screams. Meroi survived, fleeing across the river. | 03/13/12 18:04:00 By - Alan Boswell

Critics say 'Kony 2012' video distorts fight against Lord's Resistance Army

If you haven't yet seen the viral "Kony 2012" video yet, you could soon be in the minority. But the film has irked many intimate with the conflict. They charge it oversimplifies a complex war and they take issue with the group's 1-2-3 solutions. | 03/08/12 19:06:00 By - Alan Boswell

2 survivors provide intimate look inside Lord's Resistance Army

One minute, as she told it, she was minding a field outside of a remote rural area in southeastern Central African Republic; the next, she had been captured by gunmen and handed off as a wife to one of Africa's most feared warlords. | 03/05/12 14:41:00 By - Alan Boswell

African villagers embrace U.S. role in hunt for Lord's Resistance Army leader

On the edge of this quiet town in the isolated forests of central Africa sits one of America's newest military outposts, a base made of grass surrounded by razor wire. Outside, a baby chimpanzee plays on a green rope, and three local policemen lounge in a pickup truck. Inside, up to 30 U.S. special forces plot the demise of one of the world's most elusive and sadistic rebels. | 02/13/12 14:52:00 By - Alan Boswell

4 leading Kenyans charged in '07 election violence

The International Criminal Court on Monday charged four Kenyans, including two serious presidential contenders, with crimes against humanity for their alleged involvement in ethnic violence after a disputed presidential election in 2007. | 01/23/12 18:38:00 By - Alan Boswell

S. Sudan to halt oil production over dispute with Sudan

South Sudan moved Friday to shut down its oil production, the latest development in an epic game of double dare that threatens not only South Sudan's economy but also that of its neighbor and antagonist, Sudan, just six months after the world heralded the peaceful split of the old Sudan with fanfare and hurrahs. | 01/20/12 17:32:00 By - Alan Boswell

Porters are unheralded heroes of Africa's Mt. Kilimanjaro

Up from the equatorial plains they climb, into a dripping rain forest, through a shrub-riddled wasteland and across a desolate alpine desert before finally making a nighttime trudge up the lonely ice-capped crater that's Africa's tallest peak. Every year, some 50,000 or so adventurous foreigners brave the oxygen-starved air atop Mount Kilimanjaro for the stunning dawn view of the hazy shapes and shadows from which they emerged just days before. The tourists, however, aren't the only ones who make the journey. | 01/18/12 14:55:00 By - Alan Boswell

Are the snows of Kilimanjaro returning? Guide says yes

One of Mount Kilimanjaro's most dramatic features is its breathtaking glaciers, which slither across its dormant volcanic plateau and down its crater slope in frigid shades of bluish-green. | 01/18/12 14:48:00 By - Alan Boswell

South Sudan rampage toll may be in thousands amid threats of genocide

Threats of genocide and ethnically charged rhetoric are roiling South Sudan's Jonglei state one week after a days-long rampage by a tribal militia forced 50,000 people from their homes and may have left thousands dead. | 01/09/12 18:00:00 By - Alan Boswell

Militia's rampage in South Sudan reveals weakness of U.N. mission

Four hundred United Nations peacekeepers and 800 South Sudanese government troops were holding positions Wednesday in a key town in South Sudan's Jonglei state after a days-long rampage by an 8,000-strong marauding tribal militia left dozens dead and forced as many as 50,000 people to flee their homes. | 01/04/12 17:29:00 By - Alan Boswell

Rebel leader George Athor reportedly killed in South Sudan

The aging rebel, George Athor, was intercepted by a military patrol near the border with the Democratic Republic of Congo and killed, said South Sudan military spokesman Philip Aguer. Reports that Athor was killed in a firefight could not be confirmed. | 12/20/11 17:10:00 By - Alan Boswell

U.S. commandos fan out in remote Africa to help find brutal rebels

The U.S. military has dropped its first set of boots into the tropical overgrowth of central Africa, one of the most inaccessible areas of the world, to help fight a brutal rogue rebel group that's known for abducting children and mutilating the faces of victims. | 12/07/11 16:10:00 By - Alan Boswell

Western nations now on the sidelines at Sudan talks

Last week, while African leaders toiled behind closed doors at a luxury hotel to try to prevent renewed war between Sudan and South Sudan, U.S. and other Western diplomats huddled in the lobby waiting for updates. | 12/06/11 17:25:00 By - Alan Boswell

Sudan says it will seize South Sudanese oil as talks fail

Sudan vowed Wednesday to confiscate a portion of South Sudan's oil as it passes through a pipeline in Sudan as talks between the countries failed to produce any agreement on how to split oil revenues. | 11/30/11 18:05:00 By - Alan Boswell

U.S. official warns Ethiopia not to invade Somalia, but it's too late

The State Department's top Africa policymaker on Tuesday warned Ethiopia not to invade Somalia, but the warning came too late, with Somalis claiming that Ethiopian troops were already rolling through their villages in trucks | 11/22/11 18:55:00 By - Alan Boswell and Mohammed Yusuf

South Sudan and Sudan at loggerheads over oil talks

The South Sudanese government has seized what had been Sudan's share of the south's oil production and has decided to build a new pipeline that would not cross through Sudanese territory, the latest sign that the two former war foes are unlikely to resolve by negotiation the issues created when South Sudan became an independent country this summer. | 11/22/11 18:07:00 By - Alan Boswell

Four months into nationhood, South Sudan struggles

A South Sudanese rebel leader with suspected ties to Sudan declared more people "must die" for the cause of peace and democracy in the world's youngest nation after talks here between him and the South Sudanese government broke down after less than a week of negotiations. | 11/20/11 17:13:00 By - Alan Boswell

WikiLeaks: U.S. warned Kenya against invading Somalia

U.S. cables made public by WikiLeaks show that the United States warned Kenya two years ago not to launch an offensive in southern Somalia against al Qaida-allied al Shabab rebels, but a U.S. official also offered to check on the "feasibility" of a U.S. review of the plans. | 11/18/11 17:42:00 By - Alan Boswell

How big a threat is Al Qaida's North Africa branch?

An Algerian Islamist rebel group that in 2007 rebranded itself as al Qaida's affiliate in North Africa, dubbed al Qaida in the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM) has accomplished a notable feat, moving its operations from Algeria across the Sahara, the transcontinental desert that throughout history has halted empires in their tracks and for millennia kept black Africa separated from Eurasia. | 11/06/11 14:11:00 By - Alan Boswell

Violence on new South Sudan-Sudan border catches U.N. in the middle

The new nation of South Sudan faced another armed challenge on Friday as a rebel group aligned with rival Sudan to the north threatened United Nations peacekeepers, accusing them of assisting the South Sudanese army in combat against them. | 11/04/11 17:29:00 By - Alan Boswell

Kenyan forces gathering for push to seize port from Somalia's Shabab

Three weeks into their offensive against Somalia's Shabab Islamist militia, Kenyan forces are preparing for what's likely to be a decisive battle for the southern Somali port of Kismayo, which could either end Shabab's dominance in the region or add fuel to Somalia's decades-long civil war. | 11/02/11 14:47:00 By - Alan Boswell and Mohammed Yusuf

Kenyan troops press assault on Somalia al Qaida group

Kenyan troops and tanks pushed 50 miles into Somalia on Monday and Kenyan aircraft bombed suspected terrorist positions in the first stage of a military campaign intended to destroy the Islamist insurgent group al Shabab. | 10/17/11 19:03:39 By - Alan Boswell and Mohammed Yusuf

Kenyan troops press assault on Somali group linked to al Qaida

NAIROBI, Kenya — Kenyan troops and tanks pushed 50 miles into Somalia on Monday and Kenyan aircraft bombed suspected terrorist positions in the first stage of a military campaign intended to destroy the Islamist insurgent group al Shabab. | 10/17/11 18:56:00 By - Alan Boswell and Mohammed Yusuf

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