Journalism
Tom Ricks gets grilled
Military reporter for the Washington Post Tom E. Ricks gets the quiz treatment from readers today. The former Pulitzer prize winner has reported from Somalia, Haiti, Korea, Bosnia, Kosovo, Macedonia, Kuwait, Turkey, Afghanistan and Iraq and is the author of the 2006 book, FIASCO: The American Military Adventure in Iraq. Here’s a quick dip into […]
Richard Wild “unlawfully killed”
Richard Wild was killed while working on a feature about museum looting in Baghdad in July 2003. He had only been in the country for two weeks and wanted to establish himself as a war reporter. He was shot in the back of the head. At the time Oxford Coroner’s Court heard that the US […]
Getting the story out
Tim Arango, writing in the International Herald Tribune, considers the dangers facing journalists in Iraq and looks at the methods news organisations use to recruit local reporters, fixers and translators, “When you are working side by side, you get to know the person, and if the person seems unreliable, or if you ever see someone […]
David Greising on foreign correspondents
David Greising talks about being a foreign correspondent for the Chicago Tribune. Economic worries and the future of the profession are foremost in his mind. Greising’s piece is one of three taking the temperature of the people who work for the Tribune, “Nobody really knows what the fun-damental economics are going to look like going […]
Lara Logan says “Screw you”
[video:youtube:XK5WIjWXTbU] In an interview published in the Huffington Post today, CBS Chief Foreign Correspondent Lara Logan says her greatest achievement is “being able to say screw you to all the people who said that a woman like me couldn’t make it in this business” The piece originally ran in Good magazine late last year. In […]
Journalist killed in Niger
Within one minute of writing the previous post about journalist fatalities in 2007, we learn that Niger journalist and radio station director Abdou Mahaman has been killed by a landmine in the capital Niamey, He is the third civilian to die in explosions in the south since December, when the government accused Tuareg-led rebels of […]
That was the year that was
IFEX (International Freedom of eXpression Exchange) reviews 2007 at the sharp end of journalism with differing figures from the Committee to Protect Journalists (65 journalists killed), Reporters without Borders (at least 86 journalists killed), the Canadian Journalists for Free Expression (102 journalists killed) and the International Federation of Journalists (171 journalists and media workers were […]
Ross Kemp in Helmand
Ex-soap star Ross Kemp heads to Helmand in a new five-part series. The Guardian has a trailer for the series and background on Organ Grinder, “During one engagement between B Company and the Taliban, we were pinned down by enemy fire in open ground,” he says. “Bullets fizzed inches from our heads, hitting the ground […]
For journalism
BBC World Service, Deutsche Welle, Radio France Internationale, Radio Netherlands Worldwide and the Voice Of America issue “an unprecedented joint resolution denouncing what they termed growing trends towards media restrictions and attacks on journalists in many of the countries to which they broadcast.” The heads of five of the largest international broadcasters have called upon […]
Is our media dying?
[video:youtube:e09PxmPJ-Tg] Not all the indicators agree with the sentiment shown in the Simpsons video, but many of the American ones do.
Bikinis to Islamabad
Chief foreign correspondent for CBS Lara Logan secured an exclusive with Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf for the 60 Minutes show, but not all her luggage made it with her from near her hometown in South Africa, The interview capped a frantic week-and-a-half for Ms. Logan, who was vacationing on a beach near her South African […]
Ghaith Abdul-Ahad profiled
[video:youtube:JoOmquaRCx8] Menassat, an organisation that promotes good journalism in the Middle East and North Africa, begins a new series profiling arab journalists. Lebanon-based Ghaith Abdul-Ahad, who writes and photographs for The Guardian and has twice been shortlisted for best foreign correspondent of the year by the British Press Awards, is first up, “I think rule […]
The blogs of war
[video:dailymotion:x29jxt] Broadcast Journalist David Heathfield has a great 8 minute long report on the impact of the internet on how war is reported and who is reporting it in the 21st century. This video offers a good deal of background leading on from our previous post on Reporting restrictions. via cyberjournalist
The toll of foreign reporting
On today’s Desert Island Discs programme, the BBC’s Today Programme interviewee frightener John Humphrys admits working as a foreign correspondent takes its toll on family life. Humprhys adds he gave up being a foreign correspondent in 1981 because he was tired as life on the road, “I remember going on one trip when my daughter […]
Reporting restrictions
Tom Roeder of the Colorado Springs Gazette kicks off his Iraq Notebook blog by uploading a copy of the original reporting restrictions agreement he signed with the US Military before heading to Iraq, It’s fairly rare for reporters, always fond of their constitutional rights, to agree to any government-imposed restriction of their activities. It’s important […]
From the Frontline club
More words worth listening to… Roy Greenslade’s latest episode in the BBC World Service series Press for Freedom begins with Roy at the Frontline club. Who’s that laughing at the beginning?
Future of foreign reporting
The World podcast discusses the future of the foreign correspondent with HotZone war reporter Kevin Sites, ex-Baltimore Sun reporter John Schidlovsky, David Sasaki of Global Voices, McClatchy’s Roy Gutman and Ed Fooey, a media analyst. There is some talk of the ‘one man bureaus’ we discussed earlier at fromthefrontline. You can listen direct here – […]
Bruce Loudon on being a foreign correspondent
Bruce Loudon has worked as a foreign correspndent since 1968. He is currently The Australian’s South Asia correspondent. In today’s Australian he ponders the life he leads and the near misses he’s missed, Nothing concentrates the mind quite like sitting atop 10 tonnes of lethal ammunition stacked into the belly of an ancient, clapped out, […]
Miguel Gil Moreno prize announced
The 7th Miguel Gil Moreno journalism prize has just been announced. Journalists of any nationality and working in any medium can apply. However, entries must be translated into Spanish. The deadline in March. Moreno was a freelance correspondent and war reporter. He was killed in Sierra Leone, along with Reuters correspondent Kurt Schork in May […]
Fesperman on foreign correspondents
Former Baltimore Sun foreign correspondent and political thriller writer Dan Fesperman talks about his work and how he’s glad he’s not a newbie starting out in journalism today, It’s depressing. I look around, and you look at the number of foreign bureaus, and they’re fewer every day. The Sun used to have eight. Well, they […]
Foreign correspondent or spy?
It’s a bit of a cliché, but if a new book, Berlin and Beyond, is to be believed some foreign correspondents do indeed make great spies. Well, at least one of them did. Soon after Anthony Terry died in 1992, stepdaughter Judith Lenart was clearing out his desk when she discovered a bundle of letters […]
John Moore in Rawalpindi
The New York Times uses a combination of images, audio and text to rapidly create a very powerful and informative multimedia report from Getty’s John Moore who was at the scene of Benazir Bhutto’s assasination in Rawalpindi yesterday. via Ben
Top underreported stories of 2007
It’s nearly the end of the year, it must be list time. Medecins Sans Frontieres release their tenth annual top ten list of stories they think journalists don’t report enough on and readers don’t get to read enough about. Here’s the list. Or see a quick view of the list below, 1. Displaced fleeing war […]
Is this the best front page story ever?
Frontline Club Founder member Ben Hammersley emails to say he thinks it is and I’m inclined to agree with him, On December 14th [on page 1A of the Lewiston Tribune] ran two substantial photos: In one, a husky man in a black-and-blue checkered coat is seen hanging Christmas decorations in a shop window. In the […]
Stay Alert
[video:youtube:BM171IMYuKc] Recently released promovid from the rather good Reuters AlertNet service. Great for “news before it’s news” with over 400 aid agencies contributing. If you don’t already use the service, it’s certainly worth a look. via IJNet
Freedom of the press
The BBC World Service celebrates its 75th birthday today. On the Free to speak site radio page there is a discussion on the role of the service in the future, in today’s rapidly changing media landscape what does the BBC World Service have to do to ensure its future? What does it have to do […]
Richard Engel wins a duPont
Richard Engel wins a duPont Award for his MSNBC War Zone Diary which aims to give an insider’s look at the life of a war correspondent in Iraq. The 2008 duPont awards, which were announced today, were originally established in 1942 and are widely considered to be the broadcast equivalent of the Pulitzer Prizes. A […]
7th Miguel Gil Moreno Journalism Prize
The Miguel Gil Moreno Foundation and Random House Mondadori announce their competition for the seventh Miguel Gil Moreno Journalism Prize. Journalists from any country, working in any medium, are welcome to apply. Entries must be translated into Spanish. Deadline: March 24. The prize was founded in honor of Moreno, an independent correspondent and war reporter […]
Courage and Lifetime Awards
The Washington D.C.-based International Women’s Media Foundation (IWMF) is currently seeking nominations for its Courage in Journalism Awards and Lifetime Achievement Award. Last day to nominate someone is March 1, 2008. The Courage in Journalism Awards honor female journalists from all over the world who have “demonstrated extraordinary strength of character in pursuing their profession […]
The Demise and Rise of the Foreign Correspondent
“The trench coated foreign correspondent as Gregory Peck played him in the movies is suddenly almost extinct” So began Christopher Lydon on the Open Source podcast in February, 2007 in reponse to the closure of three foreign bureaus of the Boston Globe. The Globe cutbacks followed the axing of foreign staff across the Daily Telegraph. […]