Frontline Club bloggers
The Baddest, Holiest Gang, Part Three
How young Somali immigrants searched for belonging, and found jihad. Last of a three-part series. Part I can be found here. Part II can be found here. by DAVID AXE and JOHN MASATO ULMER Somali-American terror recruits have common roots in an impoverished, neglected and sometime oppressed immigrant community. Their feelings of impotence and isolation […]
The spirit of Punk lives on in Social Innovation Camps
Twenty years after the fall of the Berlin Wall, civil society activists and organizations met this week in Bratislava, Slovakia, to assess and discuss the state of civil society and democracy in Central and Eastern Europe. But, unlike previous CEE Civil Society Forums, this year’s event featured an added component: a Social Innovation Camp held […]
Georgia Sells Itself
Strange scenes outside the Georgian parliament: the entire façade of the building seems to have been transformed into a giant advertising hoarding to promote various urban reconstruction projects and new luxury hotels. It’s part of a new billboard campaign (slogan: ‘I Love Georgia’) which appears to be intended to boost public confidence as the country’s […]
The Baddest, Holiest Gang, Part Two
How young Somali immigrants to the U.S. searched for belonging, and found jihad. Second of a three-part series. by DAVID AXE and JOHN MASATO ULMER When 26-year-old Shirwa Ahmed, a Somali-born immigrant living in Minnesota, blew himself up in Puntland, Somalia, on Oct. 29 last year, he became the very first American suicide bomber, and […]
The Baddest, Holiest Gang
How young Somali immigrants to the U.S. searched for belonging, and found jihad. First of a three-part series. by DAVID AXE and JOHN MASATO ULMER On Oct. 29 last year, Shirwa Ahmed drove a car full of explosives up to a government compound in Puntland, a region of northern Somalia, and blew himself up. The […]
Guarani community set fire to in Mato Grosso do Sul
Just a few days after 130 Guarani Kaiowa indians from the community Laranjeira Ñanderu had left their traditional ladn following a judicial order, everything that was left in the place was burned down. Last night, unidentified people set fire to the 35 houses that were left in the area. Goods and animals belonging to the […]
Secretary of Defence: “Afghanistan first”
The British Secretary of Defence said operations in Afghanistan must take priority in the next Strategic Defence Review in a speech at King’s College, London. Bob Ainsworth said longer term strategic considerations should be secondary to providing the necessary equipment and manpower to British Armed Forces in Afghanistan. Ainsworth conceded that there was "significant" pressure […]
Video: Heavy rains in Mexico can’t beat the drought
Although Mexico is currently in the grip of the worst drought it has suffered since World War Two, houses flooded and streets turned into lakes this week when torrential rainfall lashed down on Mexico City and the neighboring State of Mexico. Speaking to El Universal, Ramón Aguirre, director of Mexico City’s water system, said that […]
Better Naval Coordination Suppresses Pirate Attacks
by DAVID AXE After a year of rapid growth, the international naval force assembled to combat Somali piracy has stabilized at what will probably be its permanent level. There are around 20 vessels and a handful of land-based aircraft from some dozen navies, organized into three major flotillas plus independent patrols. The U.S.-led Task Force […]
Access Denied: Twitter, Iran and embedding journalists in online culture
You can now watch the event here. The Iranian Election was the moment when Twitter “exploded into our consciousness as a really powerful newsgathering tool” Adrian Wells told the Frontline Club earlier this week. Sky’s Foreign Editor was discussing how media organisations cover ‘news black holes’ with Richard Sambrook, Head of Global News at the […]
Being a Journalist is not Enough
The rescue of kidnapped New York Times journalist Stephen Farrell is a stark reminder of the dangers of reporting from the frontline in places like Afghanistan, Iraq and Somalia where Amanda Lindhout and Nigel Brennan are still held hostage one year on. Although Mr Farrell was rescued today by NATO forces, his colleague, journalist and […]
I Went to Africa and All I Got Was This Lousy T-Shirt
I struggle slightly with the vogue for personalising conflicts around the globe so that they always end up being more about us than them (Not in Our Name, wristbands, boycotts of Israeli produce) and turning campaigning into a T-shirt and lifestyle. Sometimes it is a neat way of making people care about things going on […]
Putting mobile reporting to the test (again…)
Frontline Club bloggers seem to be meeting up and working together a lot of late. Guy Degen recently worked with Matthew Collin on a story about the breakaway territory of Abkhazia for Al Jazeera English and the latter is currently in Armenia filming two news reports for the same on the case of Mariam Sukhudyan, […]
Video: Mexico’s drought leaves city dwellers and countryside high and dry
Crops are wilting in the countryside, and the capital’s water shortage has turned dire as Mexico grapples with its worst drought in more than half a century. See the Los Angeles Times report here. Video by Deborah Bonello.
Death in El Salvador
The killing of documentary maker Christian Poveda represents a sad loss for a region much in need of greater understanding. The first, last and only time that I met the French-born filmmaker and photographer Christian Poveda was on 1 April of this year, when I interviewed him in an apartment he was renting in Mexico […]
I Think You’ll Find It’s a Bit More Complicated Than That
I’ve long been a fan of Ben Goldacre’s column Bad Science in The Guardian and his blog. It won’t surprise you to know that his use of rational thought and scientific evidence to dispel deliberate quackery and ill-thought out mumbo jumbo – take the MMR nonsense or homoeopathy – is rather popular in these quarters. […]
Azerbaijan: Video bloggers go on trial
Two months after they were arrested, detained video bloggers Adnan Hajizade and Emin Milli finally went on trial in Azerbaijan. Most observers believe that the case against the two youth activists is politically motivated and an attempt to silence the two main founders of the OL! progressive youth movement and AN Network. Using new […]
Help to keep an independent newscast on the air!
FSRN’s major financial supporter — Pacifica Foundation — is in financial difficulty and late with their payments to FSRN. This, in addition to the $160k/year cut in FSRN’s funding from Pacifica in June 2008, leaves us without enough money to pay our staff and reporters from now through mid-October. Pacifica will have the funds to […]
Video: ‘I’ve never been afraid’: Director, recently slain, talks about filming El Salvador’s gangs
Photographer and filmmaker Christian Poveda was shot dead in El Salvador Sept. 2, 2009. He spent more than 16 months, every day, with the mara gangs of San Salvador to make the 2009 documentary “La Vida Loca.” This is footage from an interview conducted by the Los Angeles Times’ Deborah Bonello with Poveda a […]
Armenian political groups fume, but little visible opposition to Turkey protocols
As the international community applauds the presidents of Armenia and Turkey for making unprecedented progress in attempts to normalize relations, others are not so ecstatic. Indeed, while many consider the establishment of diplomatic relations and the opening of borders between the two estranged neighbours as crucial in establishing peace and stability in the region, opposition […]
Christian Poveda, “la Vida Loca” director, killed in El Salvador
Reports have surfaced that French photographer and director Christian Poveda has been shot and killed in El Salvador, possibly by the gangs that his recently released documentary "La Vida Loca (the Crazy Life)" focused on. Reuters reports: Suspected Salvadorean gang members killed French filmmaker Christian Poveda, whose 2008 film "La Vida Loca" crudely depicts the […]
‘Pirates’ and ‘Protectors’ on the Black Sea
Fuel-smugglers, embargo-busters, accusations of piracy and threats of armed retribution: the temperature off the Black Sea coast of Georgia seems to be heating up towards boiling point. When I was in the disputed Black Sea region of Abkhazia a couple of weeks ago, people were worried about possible gasoline shortages because Georgian coastguards had seized a […]
Michael Yon to end Afghanistan embeds and go it alone
Independent war reporter Michael Yon has not so much burnt his military embed bridges as completely obliterated them. He claims that the Ministry of Defence has been trying to have him removed from the area of Regional Command (South) and from Thursday he will be reporting unilaterally from Helmand province. Yon was annoyed that his […]
Armenia and Turkey set to establish diplomatic relations
Following media reports earlier today that Armenian President Serge Sargsyan had "chided Turkey" for not seriously seeking to unconditionally open the border between the two countries comes unexpected news. Within the last few hours at time of writing, reports from the BBC, Reuters, AP and others now say that "domestic discussion" in the estranged neighbouring countries […]
Summer and something of a seaside independence
Earlier in August I had the opportunity to film in Abkhazia with Matthew Collin – Al Jazeera’s correspondent in Georgia and fellow Frontline blogger. It’s now one year since Russia recognised Georgia’s breakaway regions of Abkhazia and South Ossetia as independent states. The first time I visited Abkhazia was in December 2006 to produce radio […]
After 40 Years of Dictatorship, Gabon Votes
Gabon is headed to the polls for the West African country’s first real election since the rise of Omar Bongo as president some four decades ago. Bongo died in June, as one of the world’s longest-serving heads of state, and now will be replaced. Gabon, a major oil producer and one of the wealthiest and […]
Rapping for freedom and democracy in Azerbaijan (updated)
ShirBand ft Slang. Qorxaga ver cesaret: The title means ‘show courage to coward(s). The chorus is saying that this imprisonment, enslavement won’t go on for much longer; ‘your protesting tongue, your words are golden; your arms that rise fearlessly in the Square are golden.’ Then it talks about how they’re selling bullshit to everyone, […]
Evidence vs Dogma in Darfur
After six years of violence, the war in Darfur is over, according to a man who should know. General Martin Luther Agwai was handed mission impossible two years ago – setting up the joint UN and AU peacekeeping job. In an interview with the BBC, as he prepares to step down as force commander, General […]
Social media and conflict resolution in the South Caucasus
In the 15 years since the May 1994 ceasefire agreement put the conflict between Armenia and Azerbaijan over the disputed territory of Nagorno Karabakh on hold, various peace proposals have faltered. But if Armenia’s first president, Levon Ter-Petrossian, was forced to resign in 1998 by nationalist hardliners in his government opposed to a compromise settlement, […]
Michael Yon: Ministry of Defence gave me “zero warning”
In an email I received overnight, Michael Yon claims the Ministry of Defence "cut off" his embed with the British Army in Afghanistan with "zero warning and no chance for me to prepare." As I highlighted yesterday, Yon had been embedded with 2 Rifles for the last five weeks. The MoD denied that Yon’s embed […]