general
A journey Through Putin’s Russia Part 1
My trip to Russia started with a phone call from the picture desk, saying that they might want me to go to Russia in the next few days . It all becomes clear the following morning , if I want to go I have only a couple of hours to apply for a Visa and […]
Against all odds
UNHCR steps into the gaming world with an online game that allows you – the gamer – to experience what it’s like to be a refugee. To beat the game, called Against all odds, you’ll need to escape a hostile town, guide your character over dodgy borders and stay alive in foreign countries. via BBC […]
Aid dependency
Glenda Cooper writes a column in The Guardian about the changing face of foreign news reporting, telling titled From their own correspondent. She argues, convincingly, that the general public are, and always were, more likely to be the first on the scene at any major news event before the press ranks and aid workers arrive. […]
GLAMOUR women
CBS News chief foreign correspondent Lara Logan battles here phobia for crappy women’s mags to step up and accept a GLAMOUR ‘woman of the year’ award for 2007. Logan apparently had a change of heart when she discovered the magazine was also helping to fund charities like Empowering Hands, “How can you show people reality […]
Call to action
Aidan White is back in action in this post, after that post, with a call to action announced this week from the International Federation of Journalists for security for mediafolk in Iraq, The International Federation of Journalists (IFJ) today called on the international community to take special action to confront the human tragedy in Iraq […]
Do journalists need a special safety convention?
Download this episode View in iTunes From a recent debate at the Frontline Club between Geoffrey Robertson QC, Knut Doerman (ICRC), Aidan White (IFJ) and moderated by Prof Stewart Purvis (City University). Aidan White expands on the subject on the IFJ blog, There’s no better example of a country that fails to protect journalists […]
di Giovanni at the UN
War reporter Janine di Giovanni found herself among generals and activists at the UN this week calling for a halt to the illicit small arms trade, Arms control campaigners who have gathered more than one million signatures on a petition calling for the treaty formation said that in addition to former UN military leaders, some […]
Wanna buy a Pulitzer
One awarded to Newsday for public service newspaper journalism in 1974 appears to have been sold on Ebay for $4,000 via martinstabe and in the comments… “They actually have several Pulitzers on sale, all from Newsday. Kinda depressing, actually.”
Burns gets a Lovejoy
Colby College has given its annual Elijah Parish Lovejoy Award to a longtime New York Times foreign correspondent who has won the Pulitzer Prize on two occasions… …John F. Burns is a longtime foreign correspondent for The New York Times who won the Pulitzer in 1993 for his coverage of the destruction of Sarajevo and […]
5 tips for better blogging
The Daily Telegraph’s Shane Richmond does a very good job of sifting through a thread about blogging to come up with 5 tips on building a blog audience. Here’s number one, 1. Get prominent bloggers to link to you – Chris Garrett says: “That involves (for best chances) being known to them, creating killer content […]
Newsnight – report from Sangin valley, Helmand, Afghanistan
This is the full 16 minute documentary that originally aired on BBC Newsnight on 26 September, 2007. It’s available for download on Google Video. My original text from the evening that I returned from Sangin: I have been out on operations with Colour Sergeant Jim Bastin of the Inkerman Company and a platoon of the […]
In the Press Gazette
Vaughan is interviewed in the Press Gazette this week about the hows, whys and history of frontline journalism, “When we started off we wanted to have complete independence, we were paying for our own trips and we were risking our lives as well as our livelihoods but there was a problem – the only place […]
From the frontline to the Press Gazette
The Press Gazette run a piece about what we’re all about. Vaughan talks about plans for the club and for supporting journalism online which is what fromthefrontline.co.uk is essentially all about, “I think the future is going to be journalist.com, Fredbloggs.com and if that’s the case, then we’re in the best position to compete with […]
Afghanistan Newsnight website
You can view the 16 minute Newsnight documentary on the Newsnight website for, I think, three days. We’ll post the entire film on the blog, on YouTube and Brightcove as soon as we can. Meanwhile, take a minute to peruse the Newsnight Afghanistan page for related video, interviews and links to Flickr, Google Maps and […]
Pre-Newsnight showing build up
The Newsnight film shows in half an hour – and just in case you’re still tuned in here – there’s a bit more background and preamble on the BBC Newsnight website, Twenty years ago I left the Grenadier Guards to become a freelance cameraman. Three months later I was in Southern Afghanistan filming Afghans shelling […]
The three wise blogs
Not all journalists can blog, some breeze into it, but some just don’t grasp the dynamics. Old blogging journalist hand Adam Tinworth is working on blog guidance for journalists. He spies three key blog types for journalists, The Expert – If you have a depth of knowledge of your subject and can add genuinely interesting […]
War book frenzy
The Press Gazette alerts us to a rabid battle being played out at the war end of the Amazon book charts, It’s hack vs. hack in the book charts at the moment, with a battalion of war reporters piling out new books on Iraq and Afghanistan. Veteran war correspondent Patrick Bishop has written 3 Para, […]
Back in Britain with a Bag of Video Tapes
Sadly my time is up with the British Army in Afghanistan. There are lots of journalists who want the space and I will have to wait my turn to come back. I tried to get back to Kabul in time for my scheduled flight to London’s Heathrow, but this wasn’t possible so I ended up […]
Desert Caterpillars
[video:youtube:dEnPKWSBYqk] I returned from Gereshk in a convoy of “Vikingsâ€. The Royal Marines left behind these strange looking vehicles when they were here last winter. Each vehicle has two pods and wide tracks. They are highly manoeuvrable and as useful in the desert as the arctic. I am told that they can also swim. Nobody […]
The Military Press Officer
Lieutenant Commander Mike Parr of the Royal Navy has been with me wherever I go in Helmand. I would not have been allowed to come here without a “minderâ€. Mike’s main job is to make sure that I don’t compromise operational security. To check that I don’t put the soldiers lives at risk by what […]
Gereshk Evening Patrol and Fighting
[video:youtube:vF2Ec9_r4qY] Now I have arrived in a forward operating base in Gereshk, still in Helmand, where I am staying with 3 Company, Grenadier Guards. I have been told that the base is frequently mortared but the soldiers seem jovial. But it’s more than jovial. It is as if they don’t think that life can throw […]
Helicopter Deliveries in Helmand
[video:youtube:jJS124JAQ7I] Everyone likes a helicopter ride. I have been flying around with the Royal Air Force Chinooks over the British Army’s 12 Brigade’s area in Helmand as they delivered ammunition in under-slung loads. The helicopters are armed with machine guns and a chain gun to counter the ever-present threat from the Taliban. They are essential […]
Mortared in Gereshk
[video:youtube:ac0TXK6yuj0] I woke up early in the morning, and was sitting up on my camp-bed, when I heard a distant “popâ€. It took me about a second to realise what I thought it was and I reassured myself that I was under protective cover. I was right. Shortly after there was a loud explosion in […]
Chocolate Melts!
[video:youtube:x0FeOOHDcKQ] The soldiers have been living on field rations, many of them for months on end. The rations aren’t bad. They contain the right balance of nourishment that the soldiers need but they are boring day after day. Some of the Guardsmen were joking with me that their protective jackets don’t fit them anymore because […]
Photos from Basilan
New on Flickr, my photos from Basilan For hi-res downloads, low-res comps and so on, go to my photoshelter page.
Lack of events, dear boy, lack of events
It was a good choice, it seems. This weekend’s supposed Major Offensive turned out to be a let down – even if I’d been there, there was nothing to actually cover. Two soldiers were injured in a small firefight, but other than that, there was no contact with Abu Sayyaf or the MILF. Indeed, it’s […]