Mediators Trying to Avert Civil War in South Sudan

It's been a bloody week there

African mediators said they held "productive" talks on Friday with South Sudan's President Salva Kiir, trying to prevent an almost week-long conflict plunging the world's newest nation into a civil war along ethnic faultlines.

In a sign of the nervousness among South Sudan's neighbors, Ugandan soldiers flew in to help evacuate their citizens. Two anonymous military sources said they would also help secure the capital, which lies about 75 km (50 miles) from Uganda's border.

The United Nations said on Thursday a crowd of Nuer tribesmen breached a U.N. compound in Jonglei State north of the capital and it had reports that some locals sheltering there were killed. It also said two Indian peacekeepers died.