News
First Wednesday: the reporting of Haiti so far – are journalists getting it right?
Though some reporters may be guilty of over-oversimplifying the crisis left in wake of the Haiti earthquake, journalists can still aid the country’s reconstruction by reporting the truth on the ground. That was the broad consensus from panelists at a lively First Wednedsday debate at the Frontline Club, who chewed over the complex business of […]
Haiti, the fight against the Western aid policy
Christian Wisskirchen is a member of the Management Committee of the Haiti Support Group who has been involved in campaigns to work towards participatory democracy in Haiti since 1992. He has worked for the UN in Haiti in 1995, as a Human Rights Officer. Massive humanitarian aid is indispensable today, given the scale of the […]
First Wednesday: Haiti, now or never?
This month we will focus entirely on Haiti – looking at the country’s recent history and looking ahead to the meeting of international donors at the UN in March. It’s almost three weeks since an earthquake devastated the country, leaving an estimated 200,000 dead and 1.5 million homeless. We are hoping that a member of […]
Pro-gov’t MP: Designate birthday of President’s mother as Mothers’ Day in Azerbaijan
For 70 years, Soviet Azerbaijan celebrated 28 April as a national holiday – it was conceived as the victory of revolution in the country, the date of its Sovetization and liberation of workers.
Democracy is … POSSIBLE
Despite the arrest and conviction of one of their co-founders, Adnan Hajizade with an apparently trumped-up charges, OL! Youth movement has released a new video telling that they are still in and not disillusioned in their quests.
Indo-Pakistan Cricket Spat
Everyone can recall the torture of being picked last for teams at school. The stock response is to blush profusely, shuffle along in the wake of the captain that doesn’t want you and never turn up to gym class again. In the relentless tit-for-tat relationship between India and Pakistan, team selection takes on a different […]
UK’s Afghanistan ambassador stresses need to negotiate with ‘unsavoury people’
UK and international forces will need to negotiate with insurgents, warlords and people responsible for serious human rights abuses in order to achieve stability and halt the deathtoll in Afghanistan, according to the UK’s out-going ambassador to the country. Mark Sedwill, speaking at a sold-out Frontline Club event ahead of the London Afghanistan Conference this […]
‘Tweetwife’ application reminds US Admiral to use Twitter
The United States Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff says his wife, a regular Twitter user, reminds him to tweet. Admiral Mike Mullen believes Twitter and other social networking sites like Facebook are important forms of communication which enable him to stay in touch with younger members of the US military…(or at least that […]
Digital Election 2010: taking political campaigns from the doorstep to the inbox
By Patrick Smith How will the UK General Election this year be won? By getting The Sun to root for you, or being the party that has the most attractive policies, or the least gaffes? Maybe when the date rolls around – perhaps in May – the winning party will be the one that connects […]
Saving Darfur
My book is all set for its launch next month, which is one of the reasons why my Middle East blog has been a little quiet. Over at South of West though I’ve updated things with a bit more on the book, some endorsements and a list of events to promote Saving Darfur. This year […]
Somali Insurgents Claim Yemen Boost
A.U. tanks in Somalia. Photo via Somali Weyn. by DAVID AXE A spokesman for the Somali Islamic group Al Shabab told reporters his forces have been bolstered by fighters from Yemen. “We have received fighters from the Arabian Peninsula — I mean in Yemen — to bolster our fighters on the ground,” Sheikh Ali Mohamoud […]
Britain’s ambassador to Kabul Mark Sedwill at the Frontline Club
By Julie Tomlin With the start of the London Conference on Afghanistan just days away we have an exciting last minute change to the schedule: Britain’s ambassador to Kabul Mark Sedwill will be at the Frontline Club on Tuesday 26 January. This is a great opportunity to listen to the British Ambassador in […]
Documentary: From Home to Home
An ethnic Azeri originally from Armenia reads aloud the Armenian inscriptions of the tombstones in his village in Azerbaijan. An ethnic Armenian from Azerbaijan videos the Azeri graveyard in his village in Armenia, speaking over the tape in Azerbaijani before sending it off to the families of those that used to live there instead of […]
Another brick in the wall? Paidcontent conundrum poses more questions than answers…
To charge or not to charge for online news? That’s becoming the defining question for an entire generation of editors, journalists and concerned readers at the start of the 21st century. While media owners plead there is a commercial value to their content – “news isn’t free to produce,” they say – online readers weaned […]
Mountain minefield rescue at night in Iraqi-Kurdistan
I couldn’t leave him there. He was going to die. Over a hubbly bubbly and sweet chay in Dohuk this week I met Faris Zubair Ali – a highly experienced deminer and Operations Manager for the Iraqi Kurdistan Mine Action Agency. My co-producers Karlos Zurutuza and Borja Portuondo had interviewed Faris and his team at […]
Clive Stafford Smith: Journalists need to dig deeper on Guantanamo truth
View in iTunes You can watch the event here. By Patrick Smith Journalists and human rights campaigners need to “expose the truth” behind the United States’ extra-judicial prison camps such as Guantanamo Bay and Bagram prison in Afghanistan. That’s the call from leading human rights lawyer and founder of the Reprieve charity Clive Stafford Smith. […]
A view of ‘peace building’ in Afghanistan
‘Captain Cat’ has been updating a blog in an attempt to "document some of what goes on under the label of peace building" in Afghanistan. There are plenty of interesting insights in the Captain’s dispatches and the blog is well worth latching on to, if you haven’t already. Here are a couple of recent posts […]
Rupert Hamer ‘died for the truth’
The Telegraph’s defence correspondent, Sean Rayment, pays tribute to his Sunday Mirror colleague, Rupert Hamer, who became the first British journalist to be killed in Afghanistan earlier this month. "Rupert and I had many conversations about whether reporting from Afghanistan was worth the risk, especially for those of us who had families. But Rupert was […]
Frontline Club: blogging and social media training
Cross-posted from my now rather inaccurately named Mediating Conflict blog, this is just a note to let you know that I’ll be running the Frontline Club’s blogging and social media training course on 1 and 2 February 2010. Hopefully it will be great fun and a really good way to get yourself started in online […]
24/7 media world undermines use of force, says UK Minister
The Armed Forces Minister, Bill Rammell, delivered a speech yesterday in which he expressed his concern that the information age had fundamentally altered the conditions in which Britain could "project power" in the world. Talking at the Institute of Public Policy Research, Rammell noted that there were many positive benefits from the development of "access […]
What would Studs think? by Ed Vulliamy
Obama may now be Chicago’s favourite son, but to many the city’s real iconic figure is Studs Terkel, whose writings and broadcasts brought working people’s stories to an international audience. Ed Vulliamy recalls a day with the legendary chronicler of ordinary lives. As Studs Terkel marched towards the reception desk of the Chicago Tavern Club, […]
The Unbreakable Phone, erm
Rather predictable, I guess. This is what happens when you challenge someone to test your "unbreakable" phone on the telly. But I’m pleased to report that my Sonim is still going strong despite plenty of spills and thrills…
Defence correspondent Rupert Hamer killed in Afghanistan
The Sunday Mirror’s defence correspondent, Rupert Hamer, has been killed in Afghanistan while embedded with US Marines. Photographer Phil Coburn also suffered serious leg injuries when the MRAP vehicle they were travelling in was hit by an Improvised Explosive Device on Saturday. One US Marine was killed and five others were injured in the attack […]
Haiti – Future Imperfect by Tom Rhodes
Once the initial horror of the earthquake had passed, the internationalcommunity seemed determined that this most blighted state couldrise from the ruins with hope that things might change. But can it? In the days and weeks after haiti’s earthquake sent its televisual shockwaves across the world, there seemed genuine hope that this natural disaster might […]
Aid and Activism for Gaza
I spent five years living and working in Africa. The more time I spent there the more I became interested in the debate about how to best fix the problems of its many troubled nations. In particular, how do the different roles of humanitarian aid and advocacy fit together? The complementary but sometimes contradictory […]
Was CIA bomber a jihadi blogger?
That’s the question being asked by the frighteningly excellent jihadica.com. Citing an Al Qaida statement, they say: Abu Dujana al-Khurasani (real name Hammam Khalil Abu Milal) ‘the famous propagandist and writer on the jihadi forums,’ carried out the attack in Khost which left at least eight Americans dead. The news that the suicide bomber was […]
Reaction on the blogs to US intelligence in Afghanistan
The other day Major General Michael Flynn (et al) published a report which highlighted some fundamental failings of US intelligence operations in Afghanistan. US intelligence, he argued, is overly focussed on the enemy, unable to answer basic questions about local political, economic and cultural dynamics and is "only marginally relevant to the overall strategy". He […]
Peaceful coexistence in the South Caucasus
With few expecting a breakthrough in negotiations between Armenia and Azerbaijan to resolve the long-standing conflict over the disputed territory of Nagorno Karabakh, if the likelihood of ethnic Armenians and Azeris ever being able to live together in peace again seemed remote, you’d be wrong. A recent working visit to Georgia, the third of the […]
Azeri Ambassador proposes to rename Kazakhstan’s capital in favor of Nazarbayev
Ambassador of Azerbaijan to Kazakhstan Latif Gandilov suggested to the President of Kazakhstan Nursultan Nazarbayev to rename its capital Astana into Sultan-Ata (“Father Sultan”), Interfax-Azerbaijan reported.
Golden Balls of Joy
This was my Christmas Eve feast. And a new challenge is unveiled – the hunt for the best felafel. So far Afteem, just around the corner from Manger Square in Bethlehem, is in pole position. The fat, golden balls arrived fresh from the fryer, the outside crisp and crunchy and the inside was soft and […]
