Here at Enough, we often swap emails with interesting articles and feature stories that we come across in our favorite publications and on our favorite websites. We wanted to share some of these stories with you as part of our effort to keep you up to date on what you need to know in the world of anti-genocide and crimes against humanity work.

The confirmation hearing for the new head of the Africa Command, Gen. David M. Rodriguez, prompted a closer look at growing engagement from the U.S. military on the continent. Craig Whitlock of The Washington Post examines how President Obama's original intention to "pivot to Asia" turn into a "shift to Africa" over the course of his first term in office and looks set to continue.

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With operations by the Lord's Resistance Army spanning several countries and swaths of dense jungle, hunting down the rebels requires excellent real-time intelligence-something long deficient in the efforts to bring the LRA to an end. In a new issue brief published by the Enough Project, LRA analyst. Ashley Benner, offers six reasons why intelligence about the LRA is difficult to collect and suggests six ways that the U.S. could address this challenge. The brief is the second in a series detailing the main obstacles to success in the hunt against the LRA and explains what steps the U.S. and its partners should take to redouble their efforts.

The challenge of collecting and applying adequate intelligence is driven by many forces. For example, the LRA fighters operate over a vast area in ...

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As President Obama sets off on his new four-year term, the Enough Project delivered an open letter to the president outlining critical steps that the U.S. government should take to address the conflicts in the Sudans, between Sudan and South Sudan, in eastern Congo, and in areas impacted by the Lord's Resistance Army. The full letter is available on this page, and here's an overview of what Enough Co-founder John Prendergast and Executive Director John C. Bradshaw wrote.

Peace talks between the Congolese government and M23 rebel group continue in Kampala but demonstrate the clear need for a broadened peace process. The 11+1 peace framework proposed by the United Nations looks promising, but impartial facilitation and participation representative of the various actors in the region, ...

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Humanity United and USAID announced last week that the Enough Project has been selected as a winner of the 2013 Tech Challenge for Atrocity Prevention competition. Our submission, Combining Front-line Research with Cutting-Edge Technology to Identify and Stop Enablers of Mass Atrocities, won in the "Enablers" category. The challenge for individuals and organizations in this category was to develop technologies that better identify, spotlight, and deter intentional or unintentional third-party enablers of atrocities.

The idea for the Tech Challenge evolved from President Obama's pledge to support innovative solutions to prevent mass atrocities in his 2012 Genocide Prevention Initiative. The competition was hosted by InnoCentive, a leading global open innovation company seeking to provide ...

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Here at Enough, we often swap emails with interesting articles and feature stories that we come across in our favorite publications and on our favorite websites. We wanted to share some of these stories with you as part of our effort to keep you up to date on what you need to know in the world of anti-genocide and crimes against humanity work.

Congo specialist Jason Stearns explains the elements, merits, and key unknowns of the framework agreement, or "11+1 agreement," put forth by the United Nations as the basis for ending conflict in the Kivus and instituting crucial countrywide reforms in Congo. The effort seems to be the most serious attempt at peace since the last U.N.-back talks ended in 2006, but will it overcome the "backdoor deals, opacity, and lack of follow-up" characteristic of ...

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Tech giant Apple has come a long way on conflict minerals. In 2010, they were one of the worst consumer electronics companies in their response to this serious problem, and Enough Project, Campus Progress, and A Thousand Sisters protested the opening of their store in Georgetown, Washington, D.C. But Apple has started to turn the corner on conflict minerals with some substantial steps.

In their latest sustainability report, Apple announced that it had joined the Public Private Alliance on Responsible Minerals Trade, a joint effort of governments, corporations, and civil society to support Congo to develop a clean, conflict-free minerals trade. Enough is a governance committee member of the alliance, which is currently supporting a gold miners' registration project and a minerals monitoring ...

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Right now, only the groups who can either buy or bully their way into the discussion are participating in peace talks for eastern Congo. In a policy brief released today, the Enough Project's Aaron Hall and I identify incentives and coercive economic and diplomatic tools that can be used to bring the necessary parties to the negotiation table in a mindset where they are willing to make the difficult decisions necessary to forge a lasting peace. The third in a three-part series on Congo's peace process, the report argues that the international community, with behind-the-scenes U.S. leadership, must apply a carefully calibrated package of leverage on relevant stakeholders. Most analysts agree that eastern Congo needs a broader, legitimate, and internationally-mediated peace process. However, ...

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Please join Act for Sudan and hundreds of leading activists from around the country on March 10-11, 2013, for a unique educational and advocacy event focused on the brewing crises in Sudan at George Mason University, in Washington D.C. The summit includes an optional afternoon of lobbying on Capitol Hill.

This conference will draw together U.S. and international officials, humanitarians, Sudanese leaders from Sudan and in the U.S. diaspora, as well as genocide scholars, activists, and members of the media will meet and confer in one place. The summit provides opportunities to learn firsthand from those with direct experience, to gain and create new ideas for activism and advocacy, and to network.

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While much attention from the U.S. foreign policy establishment is focused on Mali at the moment, Washington's top diplomat on Africa made a compelling case to a packed auditorium at the Brookings Institution this week for why the Democratic Republic of Congo deserves a higher position on the list of strategic U.S. national priorities.

"After many years of looking at and trying to deal with a string of recurring crises in the DRC, many people have ignored or written off the country as simply hopeless," said U.S. Assistant Secretary of State for African Affairs Johnnie Carson, speaking at an event on Monday hosted by the Brookings Institution's Africa Growth Initiative. But to do so would be "a serious mistake" for the Congolese people, Congo's neighbors, and the international community, ...

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In a letter to newly appoint Secretary of State John Kerry, Rep. Frank Wolf (R-VA) called on Secretary Kerry to make the appointment of a special envoy to the Sudan(s) a top priority. The United States has always played a vital role in trying to resolve the conflicts within Sudan and between the governments of Sudan and South Sudan since before the signing of the Comprehensive Peace Agreement, or CPA. Wolf noted in his letter to Secretary Kerry:

In September 2001, President Bush appointed Senator Danforth as special envoy and his leadership was in fact instrumental in securing, after two and a half years of negotiations, the Comprehensive Peace Agreement (CPA), thereby bringing about an end to the war. Danforth was a high-profile appointment. He had the ear of the president and the ...

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