All Things Considered

Melissa Block speaks with Jennifer Cooke, director of the Africa program at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, about the deteriorating situation in Mali. Islamic militants in recent days have destroyed sacred tombs in the ancient city of Timbuktu. A military coup there in March created a power vacuum, allowing the rebel and Islamist groups to take over the northern part of the country. West African leaders this past weekend urged Mali's interim government to request outside military assistance.

President Obama has called on Congress to extend tax cuts for the middle class, while allowing rates for the wealthiest Americans to go up.

Mahmoud Dowlatabadi's new novel, The Colonel, tells the story of an Iranian military figure whose personal life demonstrates the strains in the social and political order of his native land.

The southern African nation of Botswana is grappling with a relatively new problem in the evolving AIDS pandemic: It now has a large group of HIV-positive adolescents.

The teenagers were infected at birth before Botswana managed to almost wipe out mother-to-child transmission of the virus. These children have survived because of a public health system that provides nearly universal access to powerful anti-AIDS drugs.