This meeting was presented by the International Institutions and Global Governance Program and the Women and Foreign Policy Program.

This meeting was presented by the International Institutions and Global Governance Program and the Women and Foreign Policy Program.

Recent data on organized violence shows that conflicts between a state and one or more nonstate armed groups vastly outnumber interstate conflicts. As a result, argues former international affairs fellow Payton L. Knopf in a new CFR Working Paper, the State Department needs clear guidelines as to why, when, and how its diplomats should conduct outreach to these groups.

In awarding the prize to three women activists, the Nobel committee is honoring the fact that women's full participation in society is essential to peace, says CFR's Isobel Coleman.

John Campbell, CFR's Ralph Bunche senior fellow for Africa policy studies, discusses the recent escalation of violence by Nigeria's radical Islamic movement, Boko Haram, and analyzes strategies to undermine the threat.

Ernest Bai Koroma, president of Sierra Leone, and Alassane Ouattara, president of Cote d'Ivoire, discuss the post-conflict growth of their respective countries, as well as their individual involvement in the African Union.

Ernest Bai Koroma, president of Sierra Leone, and Alassane Ouattara, president of Côted'Ivoire, discuss the post-conflict growth of their respective countries, as well as their individual involvement in the African Union.

John Campbell says diplomacy and democracy--not firepower--is the best way to undermine Nigeria's growing Islamist threat.

Somalia's growing famine partly stems from a global failure to act on warning signs, but it's exacerbated by militant group al-Shabaab, factions of which are blocking aid delivery and might have to be negotiated with, says Africa analyst Rashid Abdi.

The Nation's Jeremy Scahill offers a look into CIA counterterrorism operations in Somalia, particularly the CIA presence in Mogadishu. Washington is intensifying its focus on Somalia, including targeted strikes by U.S. Special Operations forces, drone attacks, and expanded surveillance operations.

UN Security Council resolution 1999 was adopted without vote on July 13, 2011. In the resolution, the Council recommended to the General Assembly that South Sudan be admitted to the UN.

The process that led to South Sudan's independence offers lessons for avoiding a new, devastating conflict in the region and underscores the importance of sustained and vigorous U.S. diplomacy, writes CFR's Payton Knopf from the new country's capital.

In a Bloomberg feature, Noah Feldman explains the instructive problems posed by the case of captured Somali terrorist Ahmed Abdulkadir Warsame.

As part of Under Suspicion, a Washington Post series on the lives of American Muslims in the decade following 9/11, Eli Saslow examines the case of Abdirizak Bihi, a Somali-American Muslim activist at the helm of a community-based counterterror group in Minnesota.

John Campbell states, "Rather than resolving the generations-long Sudan crisis, Juba's independence on July 9 merely opens a new chapter in a familiar, complicated story."

South Sudan's independence July 9 could encourage secession efforts elsewhere in sub-Saharan Africa, but elites in those countries will likely stymie those attempts at challenging colonial borders, at least for now.

In looking at the successful resolution of the political standoff in Côte d'Ivoire, most commentators have focused on the role of France and the UN.

John Campbell and Asch Harwood discuss the challenges facing Nigeria's newly elected president, Goodluck Jonathan.

Paul Kagame, president of the Republic of Rwanda, discusses Rwanda's domestic and foreign policies, as well as the dire need for a stronger energy infrastructure.