In the past twenty years budget cuts across the foreign news industry have seen the near-demise of Western foreign correspondents posted abroad. In their place, local-national stringers have become increasingly important providers of foreign news stories. While the nature of conflicts changes and reporting from high-risk zones becomes more dangerous, the traditional model of the foreign correspondent has shifted. The majority of foreign news is no longer gathered by traditional foreign correspondents posted abroad, but by local nationals who were born and raised in the country they report on.
Is the foreign correspondent an endangered species in the news industry? What new models of foreign reporting are emerging alongside new information-gathering technologies? We will be joined by an expert panel to discuss trends in the industry and the future role of the foreign correspondent.
This is a free ticketed event – attendees must book via the link on this page.
Chair:
Rachael Jolley is the editor of Index on Censorship magazine.
Speakers (full panel announced soon):
Kim Sengupta is Defence Correspondent at The Independent.
Dr Haider Al Safi is a London-based Iraqi journalist and media consultant covering middle eastern politics. He started working as a journalist in 2003 during the American invasion of Iraq and ran the office for The Independent newspaper in Baghdad. Together with his colleagues he covered stories from all over Iraq exposing him to the dangers of war – he was caught in cross-fire, kidnapped and witnessed suicide attacks. He is Executive Producer of Hard-Talk Arabic.
Caroline Lees is a former news and foreign correspondent who has worked as South Asia correspondent for the Sunday Times, covering Afghanistan, Pakistan, India, Kashmir and other areas. She has also covered many parts of Africa, including Eritrea for the Economist, the fall of Mobutu in the then Zaire and refugee camps in Goma. She has been an assistant foreign editor at the Sunday Times, Sunday Telegraph, foreign editor at the Sunday Express and Scotland on Sunday. She is now a researcher at the Reuters Institute for the Study of Journalism at the University of Oxford, and is editor of a Europe-wide network of journalism research platforms, the European Journalism Observatory.
Samira Shackle is a London-based freelance journalist who has reported extensively on Pakistan over the last five years, for publications including the Guardian, Times, Independent, and New Statesman. She has also reported from India, Bangladesh and Kenya for a range of British and international outlets. In 2015 she was shortlisted in the foreign correspondent category in the Words By Woman awards and the New Voices category of the One World Media awards. She was the 2015 recipient of the Times’ Richard Beeston fellowship for foreign reporting.
]]>This screening will be followed by a panel discussion with director Misja Pekel, writers Ben Judah and Peter Pomerantsev, and journalist Richard Gizbert.
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The rocket that shot down flight MH17 was actually intended for Vladimir Putin’s plane. That is, if we were to believe the headline Russia Today (RT) was running in the first hours after the tragedy. The disaster with the Malaysian Airlines flight wasn’t the first time the news channel stirred controversy with its reporting. In November of 2014, Ofcom gave RT a warning for impartial reporting on the uprising in Maidan Square in Kiev.
The channel was launched in 2005 under the name Russia Today to bring the Russian perspective on world events to a global audience. Almost ten years later, RT broadcasts in five languages and can be received almost all over the world. It is now the biggest news organisation on YouTube with 2 billion views, more then CNN and BBC together.
Its critics call it a bullhorn for Russian propaganda, RT claims only to show a different perspective on world events, and presents itself as an alternative to the mainstream media. In Misja Pekel’s The World According to Russia Today, current and former employees, journalists and media analysts dissect RT’s modus operandi. What is it like to work for the channel? How much influence does the Kremlin really have? And is it possible to discern between fact and opinion when Russian interests are at stake?
Directed by Misja Pekel
Duration: 40′
Year: 2015
The Panel:
Ben Judah is the author of Fragile Empire: How Russia Fell In And Out Of Love With Vladimir Putin published by Yale University Press.
Peter Pomerantsev is an author, TV producer, and Senior Fellow at the Legatum Institute. Nothing is True and Everything is Possible, his book about working in Russian media, was released by Faber in February. It has been short listed for the Pushkin House Award for Russia books, and was a BBC Book of the Week.
Richard Gizbert is a Canadian broadcast journalist. He is the presenter of the Listening Post on Al Jazeera English. Over the past 25 years, he has covered stories in more than 50 countries on five continents.
]]>In 2012, the brutal gang rape on a Delhi bus of a 23-year-old medical student, who later died from her injuries, made international headlines and ignited protests. India’s Daughter is an impassioned plea for change and a tribute to a remarkable and inspiring young woman. The film explores the compelling human stories behind the incident and the political ramifications in India.
BAFTA winning filmmaker Leslee Udwin, herself a victim of rape, went to India inspired by the protests against sexual assault. With an all Indian crew, she got exclusive, first time on camera interviews with the rapists and defence attorney.
This month India’s government banned the film while the BBC moved their planned broadcast up by days and ignited a new controversy.
Following the screening we will be joined by director Leslee Udwin and others to discuss the international reactions to the film, the aftermath of the Indian broadcast ban, and the greater issue of gender based violence.
Yasmin Ali Bhai Brown is a journalist who has written for The Guardian, Observer, The New York Times, Time Magazine, Newsweek, The Evening Standard, The Mail and other newspapers and is now a regular columnist on The Independent and London’s Evening Standard. She is also a radio and television broadcaster and author of several books exploring immigration, feminism, and race relations.
Directed by: Leslee Udwin
UK/India 2015
Runtime: 62 minutes
This screening is presented with the help of iProbono.
iProbono is a non-profit network connecting lawyers to civil society organisations and activists. The network’s global outreach enables the legal community to engage in projects from around the world and allows organisations to source assistance both locally and across jurisdictions.
As part of its free speech campaign in India, iProbono is representing Leslee Udwin and ‘India’s Daughter’.
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Join us for a day long masterclass, moving from the basic elements of television packaging through to the most sophisticated techniques, making extensive use of tape material. It is designed to work for both newcomers and experienced professionals who want to improve their storytelling.
The session will be led by Vin Ray, a former BBC Foreign Editor, Executive Editor and the founding Director of the BBC College of Journalism. During his time at the BBC, Ray was in charge of on-air talent and recruited and developed many of the corporation’s best known journalists. He was described as ‘a revered teacher’ by Andrew Marr, one of the many journalists Ray trained. In 2004, he was awarded the Dart Centre’s ‘Distinguished Media Leadership Award’ at a ceremony in New York. He left the BBC in 2010 and now works as a writer, consultant and trainer.
Here’s what participants had to say about Vin’s recent masterclass at the club:
“Truly inspirational and motivating.”
“Just an excellent, informal course.”
“Everything and more than I expected.”
“I learnt more in one day with Vin than I have in three years at college.”
“Really enjoyed the course. The way he presented things was easy to understand.”
“So much to know, so very interesting.”
“Brilliant.”
“I can’t wait to apply what I’ve learnt!”
You will learn a range of essential craft skills and techniques: how to write sentences that work for TV, techniques the great writers use, how to use natural sound, how to script pictures, how to make stories flow, and how to achieve clarity. You will learn some powerful techniques for structuring stories. We will also look at what makes a good piece to camera, and more personal issues like vocal delivery. Along the way we’ll look at issues like using humour and reporter involvement.
Image Credit: BBC College of Journalism
]]>You will learn a range of essential craft skills and techniques: how to write sentences that work for TV; techniques the great writers use; how to use natural sound; how to script pictures; how to make stories flow; how to achieve clarity. You will learn some powerful techniques for structuring stories. We will also look at what makes a good piece to camera, and more personal issues like vocal delivery. Along the way we’ll look at issues like using humour and reporter involvement.
The session will be led by Vin Ray, a former BBC Foreign Editor, Executive Editor and the founding Director of the BBC College of Journalism. During his time at the BBC, Vin was in charge of on-air talent and recruited and developed many of the corporation’s best known journalists. He was described as ‘a revered teacher’ by Andrew Marr, one of the many journalists Vin trained to broadcast. In 2004, he was awarded the Dart Centre’s ‘Distinguished Media Leadership Award’ at a ceremony in New York. He left the BBC in 2010 and now works as a writer, consultant and trainer.
Image Credit: BBC College of Journalism
]]>The Frontline Club Awards for excellence in journalism aim to recognise recognise journalistic integrity, courage and independence of spirit, and include the work of freelances.
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]]>National Council for Television and Radio has banned international radio
stations from broadcasting on national frequencies. The decision went
effective on the 1st of January removing three radio stations from
FM band – VOA, BBC and Azadliq (“Liberty”), RFE/RL’s Azeri service. With
another decision, Parliament
of Azerbaijan approved a referendum to be held early next year to remove
the time limit on presidential terms. Currently a person can be elected to the
office of the President of Azerbaijan only twice, whereas ruling party wants
the country to hold a referendum to eliminate any such limits to open the way
for the possible re-election of the incumbent president, Ilham Aliyev.
In a country with a tight government control over media, the
ban on the international radio stations were seen by some as an attack on the
last remnants of free speech. Particularly, the ban of Azadliq met a protest
from politically active segments of the society. Mammad Suleymanov,
a left-wing columnist from local Bizim
Yol newspaper, called Azadliq “the last Bastille of free speech [in
Azerbaijan]” and added that the government took this Bastille very easily.
According to him “everyone starting from taxi drivers to housewives were
listening to Azadliq and only this was enough argument for closing it”.
International reactions (mostly of regret and condemnation)
to this move of the Azeri government continue to arrive and Azerbaijan
International keeps a good record of them. Azerbaijan International also
published the letter of one Azadliq
journalist describing the last minutes of the radio. Azadliq completed its programs on FM band with overture
from Koroglu, the most patriotic
and the most beloved Azeri opera composed by Uzeyir Hajibekov. While
Sözün Düzü posted a video from YouTube,
where a group of Azeri youth was filmed marking New Year together with those
last minutes of Azadliq. One of the youth
interviewed in the video says that he had come to share the grief of Azadliq,
while other comments that “they can close Azadliq (“Liberty”), but Liberty will
surely come to this country.”
Tabula
Rasa writes that “they silence the alternative voices” and asks “Why now?”
Then he gives three hypothetical answers to his question: (a) either the
government “prepares to sign a capitulatory peace on Nagorno-Karabakh”; (b) or
they “want to hold the referendum without any troubles”, or (c) “as the price
of oil fell four times, the economy is in a bad condition, therefore government
tries to prevent any possible awakening in minds”.
With three international radios silenced on national
frequencies, the country heads for a nationwide referendum to decide whether to
lift constitutional obstacles to re-election of someone for the office of the
President more than two times. With the parliamentary proposal made
on the 19th of December, Constitutional Court’s approval five
days later, and the decision of the Parliament made
on 26th of December, the whole procedure took only seven days,
and the referendum is set for March 18, 2009.
Meanwhile, Ali Hasanov, head of the
Socio-Political Department of the Presidential Administration, expressed his
regret that this move of Azerbaijani government is interpreted as banning
the broadcast of these radios in Azerbaijan. According to his words, “it won’t
be difficult for a listener to switch from FM band to short waves, and those
who want will listen to these radios in any case.” The only reason behind this
move was the laws of Azerbaijan which states that national frequencies can be
operated only by national companies and Azerbaijani citizens, Ali Hasanov told
to Day.az, main Russian-language Internet news
portal of Azerbaijan.