The haggling under a broad mango tree in the dusty, hot Sudanese village of Gogrial had dragged on for four hours. Flies buzzed around; seven-year-old boys toting automatic rifles played among the grass huts; a vulture watched from a thatched roof. Guerrilla commander Kerubino Kwanyin Bol, in sunglasses and camouflage fatigues and with an AK-47 propped against his chair, wanted $2.5 million for the three Red Cross hostages.
"You're not getting that," Congressman Bill Richardson said. The best he could offer was bags of rice, four jeeps, nine radios, help in sanitizing the local water, and vaccines for the village children....
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