This summer the Frontline Club is heading to Wilderness Festival – we hope to see you all there.

Just a few months ago Palestinians might have had reason to be cautiously optimistic as rivals Fatah and Hamas formed a unity government. But when in mid-June three Israeli teenagers were killed and violence between Hamas and Israel began to escalate, any glimmer of hope for progress was soon diminished.

What we have seen since is the horrific consequence of yet another escalation in the Israeli–Palestinian conflict and as always those who pay the dearest price are ordinary people, many of them children.

At Wilderness Festival the Frontline Club will be bringing together a panel of journalists who have covered the conflict, to shed light on what has been happening on the ground. They will be discussing how this latest escalation is different from those we have seen in the past and the perils of reporting this age-old conflict.

Chaired by Lindsey Hilsum, international editor at Channel 4 News.

Speakers:

Kim Sengupta, defence and diplomatic correspondent at The Independent.

Anna-Lisa Fuglesang, news editor at Channel 4 News.

Chris Morris, Europe Correspondent for BBC News.

We are developing an animated feature film about real lives in North Korea, to be written and directed by BAFTA award-winning filmmaker Andy Glynne. Told through the stories of defectors, Nothing to Envy will combine their testimony with animation to provide an insight into the lives of ordinary North Koreans.

Throughout the making of the film, we want to engage audiences with some of the issues surrounding North Korea, and are starting this with an event at the Frontline Club. Right now, with the recent accession of Kim Jong-un all eyes are on North Korea, asking important questions about its political and economic future and the impact this will have on the North Korean people. Joining us to discuss these issues are:

Kim Joo-il, North Korean defector and Campaigner.

Baroness Cox, vice chairman of the All Party Parliamentary Group on North Korea and CEO of the Humanitarian Aid Relief Trust (HART).

Aidan Foster-Carter, Honorary Senior Research Fellow in Sociology and Modern Korea, University of Leeds.

Rajiv Narayan, researcher for East Asia Team at Amnesty International.

North Korea remains one of the most inaccessible – and the most unfilmable – places in the world. Barbara Demick’s book opened the doors into the lives of ordinary North Koreans and provided a real insight into their stories and the hardships they face. But what is life like in North Korea now, 3 years since the book was written, and since the death of Kim Jong-il and the succession of his son Kim Jong-un?

We’ll be asking our panel about the impact of the new leader on the ordinary people of North Korea and what this might mean for their futures, as well as what continues to drive North Koreans to defect and whether there are any signs of a resistance. We’ll also be discussing what (if anything) we can do to address North Korea’s human rights situation, and the role that projects like Nothing to Envy can have in this.

You are welcome to arrive from 6:30pm for a 7pm start. Complimentary drinks and nibbles will be served.

Voted journalist of the century in his native Poland Ryszard Kapuściński is renowned across the globe for his coverage of the developing world during the final stages of European colonialism.

Whilst covering revolutions and coups across Africa throughout the ’60s and ’70s he was known to carry two note books. One he would use to record the facts used in his reports, the second for observations and experiences that would form the content of his many books that in his 40s gave him fame on the global stage. He described his work as “literary reportage” which allowed him to translate incommunicable stories of suffering from the developing world to audiences in the developed world.

We will be joined by a panel including Artur Domoslawski the author of Ryszard Kapuściński: A Life to discuss the work of this renowned journalist and his influence on journalism today. We will be asking to what extent Kapuściński blurred the line between journalism and literature.

Chaired by Victoria Brittain, former associate foreign editor at the Guardian where she covered Asia, Africa and the Middle East. Her books include Hidden Lives, Hidden Deaths: South Africa’s Crippling of a Continent, Death of Dignity: Angola’s Civil War and the forthcoming Shadow Lives: The Forgotten Women of the War on Terror. She is co-author with Moazzam Begg of his book Enemy Combatant, A British Muslim’s journey to Guantanamo and Back. She is author and co-author of two plays about Guantanamo.

With:

Artur Domoslawski, a writer on international politics for the weekly review Polityka and for the Polish edition of Le Monde Diplomatique, and for two decades reported for the Polish daily Gazeta Wyborcza. In 2010 he received Poland’s prestigious Journalist of the Year award. A Knight Fellow at Stanford University in 2005-6, he is the author of five books, and is currently working on a book about contemporary Latin America.

John Ryle, a British writer and specialist in Eastern Africa. He is co-founder and executive director of the Rift Valley Institute, and Legrand Ramsey Professor of Anthropology at Bard College, NY. He is a board member of the Media Development Loan Fund and of the scholarly journal African Affairs.

Antonia Lloyd-Jones, an award winning full time translator of Polish literature ranging from novels to reportage, biographies and poetry. One of her most recent works is Artur Domoslawski’s book, Ryszard Kapuściński: A Life.

A gathering at the Frontline Club was held in remembrance for Anthony Shadid, two-time Pulitzer Prize-winner, who died in February this year while crossing the border out of Syria.

The room was filled with family, friends and colleagues, including his wife, Nada Bakri; Jonathan Rugman, foreign affairs correspondent at Channel 4 News who was with Anthony in Syria; Kareem Fahim from The New York Times; and Katia Jarjoura, friend and filmmaker who documented the rebuilding of his family’s house in southern Lebanon. The evening was chaired by Granta editor, John Freeman.

The trials and tribulations of Anthony’s project to rebuild his family home are captured in Jarjoura‘s filming and in his posthumously published book, House of Stone, a book that moves beyond the story of a house, encompassing family, history and the hopes for a Middle East about which he was passionate.

“I was fascinated to see a war reporter – even though Anthony never wanted to be called a ‘war reporter’ – who could spend hours watching the colours of the stone change through the light, or the wind through the trees, or picking up olives, or just listening to the people around him – I never thought that such a person could exist.” — Katia Jarjoura

Such patience, warmth and listening was evident in his reporting, and Kareem Fahim expanded on Anthonys role in developing a new language in journalism – or ‘poetry on a deadline’, as John Freeman called it – and in redefining the relationship between the US and the Middle East.

“He was an incredible mentor, incredibly gracious, and he had a reputation as one of the good guys. I wasn’t prepared for how generous he was, how passionate he was about what he did or how disciplined he was as a journalist – he had an incredible number of gifts and he wore them all very lightly.” — Kareem Fahim

Fahim also spoke about how special the “Arab Spring” was to Anthony, how for him it was vindicating because he had so much love for the region and higher hopes for the people he was reporting on. And such was his insight and grasp, that what strikes him most now, is how much people miss his voice. He wasn’t an analyst but he illuminated things that others missed.

“One evening I walked into a room in northern Syria and there, sitting like a pasha on the floor wreathed in cigarette smoke, and engaged in conversation was Anthony Shadid. He had a pile of notebooks in front of him, which were bulging with his handwriting. And those were the stories he was going to write for The New York Times, which he never got to write.” — Jonathan Rugman

Yet, said Rugman, “he looked like a man in his element, because he’d got the story he wanted to tell, the story of remarkably ordinary people doing the most extraordinary things”. To him is left the memory of a Levantine dreamer, a man who believed in a better Middle East and was looking for it. Anthony’s approach to journalism and the stories he tried to tell is expanded in this conversation with Jillian Schwedler, Professor of Political Science at University of Massachusetts.

Rugman summed up Anthony with an extract from House of Stone about Dr Kkairalla, in whom he saw his reflection:

Simply put, he was the kind of man I wanted to be, but worried I would never become – gentle and kind, principled, ever curious. Choices didn’t seem to disturb him; in the fullest of lives, the way forward was easier to discern. I felt shy around him. I was too eager to impress, too reluctant to offend. I suppose I admired him too much.  

His wife and fellow reporter, Nada Bakri, said: “To me, this is Anthony. He was really fascinated by Dr Kkairalla because he saw in him all the things he wanted to be.”

The evening paid tribute to a man who loved to listen and to tell stories, no matter who was telling them. Oliver August from The Economist, who reported from Iraq alongside Anthony, remembered his inability to dislike anyone, even Ahmad Chalabi.

“Anthony liked people: to sit with them and talk with them. It was his thing. He really liked people and their stories.” — Nada Bakri

Watch the event here:

Anthony Shadid spent most of his professional career covering the Middle East, first for the Associated Press; then The Boston Globe, The Washington Post and finally The New York Times – for which he was working when he died in February this year while crossing the border out of Syria. At this special event we will be joined by friends and colleagues of Anthony Shadid to remember the life and work of this most esteemed journalist.

Followed by a drinks reception.

His knowledge of the region and his ability to translate the stories of the people to a global audience has seen him recognised as one of the most gifted journalists of his generation. He won the Pulitzer Prize for International Reporting twice; first in 2004 for his coverage of the U.S. invasion of Iraq and the occupation that followed. Second, for his coverage of Iraq as the United States began its withdrawal.

In March last year Shadid was captured by Colonel Muammar Gaddafi’s forces in Libya with three other New York Times reporters and held for six days. On his release he did not return to the US, but to the house his great-grandfather had built and he had embarked on restoring in southern Lebanon. His most recent book House of Stone: A Memoir of Home, Family, and a Lost Middle East recounts this journey of restoration entwined with the story of his family’s flight from Lebanon and resettlement in America.

With contributions from:

New York Times reporter and wife of Anthony Shadid, Nada Bakri.

Jonathan Rugman, foreign affairs correspondent at Channel 4 News.

Kareem Fahim, Middle East reporter for The New York Times.

Katia Jarjoura, journalist and filmmaker.

Chaired by John Freeman, editor of Granta.

What do the recent deadly attacks in Iraq tell us about the country today?

It has been nearly ten years since the US-led invasion and nearly a year since the last foreign troops withdrew. But is there anything about the state of the country they left behind that can begin to explain this recent wave of violence?

Although al-Qaeda forces appeared to have been pushed back, there has been an increase in violence that culminated on 23 July in the bloodiest day since US troops left Iraq. Coordinated bombings and shootings in 15 cities left over 100 people dead and many more injured.

What impact will al-Qaeda’s mission to regain ground have on political tensions among the main Shia, Sunni and Kurdish factions? 

Join us with a panel of experts to discuss the situation in Iraq today and what impact the conflict on its doorstep in Syria might have on the country.

Chaired by Elizabeth Palmer, CBS News correspondent.

With:

Tom Hardie-Forsyth, a senior adviser to the Prime Minister’s office, Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG), Northern Iraq. He is a former Chairman of the NATO Critical Infrastructure Protection Committee at its Brussels HQ, and is now a Fellow of the Atlantic Council. He was commissioned in The Royal Signals Regiment, where he saw active service in the Gulf and Northern Iraq. 

Charles Tripp, professor of Middle East politics at the School of Oriental and African Studies (SOAS). Among his books are A History or Iraq, Islam and the Moral Economy: The Challenge of Capitalism and The Power and the People: Paths of resistance in the Middle East.

Patrick Cockburn, senior Middle East correspondent since 1979 for the Financial Times and, presently, The Independent. He is an experienced commentator on Iraq and has written several books on the country including The Occupation: War and Resistance in Iraq and Muqtada: Muqtada al-Sadr, the Shia Revival, and the Struggle for Iraq.

Kamran Karadaghi, former senior political correspondent for the London-based daily Al-Hayat from 1988 to 1998. He has worked as a journalist, interpreter, diplomatic correspondent, and editor for more than 40 years. From 1998 to 2004 he was deputy director and chief editor of Radio Free Iraq at Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty. From 2005 to 2007 he served as the chief of staff and the official spokesperson for Iraqi President Jalal Talabani.

Anthony Shadid spent most of his professional career covering the Middle East, first for the Associated Press; then The Boston Globe, The Washington Post and finally The New York Times – for which he was working when he died in February this year while crossing the border out of Syria. At this special event we will be joined by friends and colleagues of Anthony Shadid to remember the life and work of this most esteemed journalist.

Followed by a drinks reception.

His knowledge of the region and his ability to translate the stories of the people to a global audience has seen him recognised as one of the most gifted journalists of his generation. He won the Pulitzer Prize for International Reporting twice; first in 2004 for his coverage of the U.S. invasion of Iraq and the occupation that followed. Second, for his coverage of Iraq as the United States began its withdrawal.

In March last year Shadid was captured by Colonel Muammar Gaddafi’s forces in Libya with three other New York Times reporters and held for six days. On his release he did not return to the US, but to the house his great-grandfather had built and he had embarked on restoring in southern Lebanon. His most recent book House of Stone: A Memoir of Home, Family, and a Lost Middle East recounts this journey of restoration entwined with the story of his family’s flight from Lebanon and resettlement in America.

With contributions from:

New York Times reporter and wife of Anthony Shadid, Nada Bakri.

Jonathan Rugman, foreign affairs correspondent at Channel 4 News.

Kareem Fahim, Middle East reporter for The New York Times.

Katia Jarjoura, journalist and filmmaker.

Chaired by John Freeman, editor of Granta.

Voted journalist of the century in his native Poland Ryszard Kapuściński is renowned across the globe for his coverage of the developing world during the final stages of European colonialism.

Whilst covering revolutions and coups across Africa throughout the ’60s and ’70s he was known to carry two note books. One he would use to record the facts used in his reports, the second for observations and experiences that would form the content of his many books that in his 40s gave him fame on the global stage. He described his work as "literary reportage" which allowed him to translate incommunicable stories of suffering from the developing world to audiences in the developed world. 

We will be joined by a panel including Artur Domoslawski the author of Ryszard Kapuściński: A Life to discuss the work of this renowned journalist and his influence on journalism today. We will be asking to what extent Kapuściński blurred the line between journalism and literature.

Chaired by Victoria Brittain, former associate foreign editor at the Guardian where she covered Asia, Africa and the Middle East. Her books include Hidden Lives, Hidden Deaths: South Africa’s Crippling of a Continent, Death of Dignity: Angola’s Civil War and the forthcoming Shadow Lives: The Forgotten Women of the War on Terror. She is co-author with Moazzam Begg of his book Enemy Combatant, A British Muslim’s journey to Guantanamo and Back. She is author and co-author of two plays about Guantanamo.

With: 

Artur Domoslawski, a writer on international politics for the weekly review Polityka and for the Polish edition of Le Monde Diplomatique, and for two decades reported for the Polish daily Gazeta Wyborcza. In 2010 he received Poland’s prestigious Journalist of the Year award. A Knight Fellow at Stanford University in 2005-6, he is the author of five books, and is currently working on a book about contemporary Latin America.

John Ryle, a British writer and specialist in Eastern Africa. He is co-founder and executive director of the Rift Valley Institute, and Legrand Ramsey Professor of Anthropology at Bard College, NY. He is a board member of the Media Development Loan Fund and of the scholarly journal African Affairs.

Antonia Lloyd-Jones, an award winning full time translator of Polish literature ranging from novels to reportage, biographies and poetry. One of her most recent works is Artur Domoslawski’s book, Ryszard Kapuściński: A Life.

A lively audience gathered at the Frontline Club as a distinguished panel grappled with the factors driving change in India. Leaving the country’s recent growth wobble aside, the panellists unravelled the economic revolution that has thrust India to the front of the global stage.

The discussion began on a positive note as travel writer and author Oliver Balch recounted stories from his latest book India Rising.  His optimism for the future of India lays in his belief that young Indians can now realistically aspire to a professional career.

“For the first time if you’re the son of a carpenter, who’s the son of a carpenter, you don’t necessarily have to be a carpenter. That is a dramatic change… For the Indian youth to have the chance to be something else, that’s what the economic story has given.”  

Balch’s positivity was complemented by the cautious optimism of second speaker Dr. Ruth Kattumuri, co-Director of the India Observatory and Asia Research Centre at LSE. Stating that India has improved vastly in the past 40 years and remains a work in progress, Kattumuri praised the strength of India’s plural democracy.

“The fact that people have a voice to say what they want, to go and demonstrate in the streets, the fact that Anna Hazare is able to influence certain things in the country, that’s what makes India dynamic.”

Moderator Shahzeb Jillani, South Asia Editor at BBC World Service News then brought in Abhik Sen of the Economist Group and the discussion moved towards doubts over the sustainability of India’s rise.

“For everything that is true about India, the opposite is true as well. For every great entrepreneurial success story that Oliver’s written about, there are thousands if not millions of possible success stories that have been stymied by all kinds of forces beyond the control of individuals.”

Sen cast doubt on the popular idea that India is a land of inventive entrepreneurs, stating that many Indians have to show a street wise cunning in order to survive.

“This entrepreneurial spirit that we talk about, it’s not something that’s been plucked from Mars. It is something that all Indians have to be to get through daily life. You have to be an entrepreneur of sorts to get a gas connection or a phone connection. You have to be innovative and inventive to make sure that you’ll have food on your table.”

Robert Wallis of the Panos photo agency added another sceptical voice as the lights were dimmed and the audience treated to a multimedia piece. The short piece detailed the impact of mining activity on agrarian communities in Jharkhand state.

“Most of these mining operations are highly industrialised so there’s very little employment for former farmers. The only employment that results for the people whose land this once is usually a type of scavenging.”

In a lively Q & A session, the panel debated the above issues without reaching a consensus although they agreed that the implementation of people’s rights is an important step for India.

So, chaired by Richard Sambrook, we are pulling in many of the events attendees and other parties to properly think through the ideas that came up before re-presenting them. We will look for workable refinements on duty of care issues, consider how safety training might cover new threats, study how freelance insurance could deliver and think how best to launch a safety ‘Kitemark’ for freelances. We aim to report at the end of September.

It is clear that the Frontline Club can play a collaborative role in promoting workable ideas on news safety. Our relationship with practitioners, the club’s members, and our history in freelance journalism places us in a unique and complimentary position to other bodies that promote news safety, like INSI or the CPJ.

To inform the 8^th May meeting I sent out survey to freelance photojournalists, video journalists and newspaper stringers. Below are links publishing the results.

The Frontline Club Freelance Safety Survey is the first survey of its kind. Freelances play an ever-increasing role in gathering the news, their importance to journalism is unlikely to diminish but their voices are rarely heard on issues like news safety. It is clear that they need to be.

In 1989, when Peter Jouvenal, Rory Peck and Nick della Casa and I launched the Frontline News Television agency, we were completely dependent on the established news industry to purchase and publish our work. This is changing, particularly for photojournalists who increasingly fund their work elsewhere, viewing the established industry as a partner or outlet rather than an employer.

Personally, I believe that freelances have become journalism’s great hope. For as long as I have been in news they have complimented the mainstream output and with most overseas bureaux a thing of the past they help fill widening gaps.

At Frontline News Television we learned from the news industry. We weren’t welcomed by it, but we soon realised that to be accepted we had to subscribe to journalism’s ethics and did so fully. The survey tells us that today’s freelances will do the same thing now on safety and since freelances mentor each other good practice can be spread.

In the survey I ask freelances the question, “If the Frontline Club launched a representative body for independent journalists, cameramen and photographers would you support this and continue to contribute your opinions?”, 90.7% of respondents indicated “Yes, wholeheartedly”, 8.8% said that ‘It was a good thing but they wouldn’t participate” and only 0.5% that this “Was not interesting”.

While we consider it how to best deliver on this mandate, the Frontline Club will continue to gather freelance views and present them as helpfully as possible. I am personally convinced that an industry recognised ‘Kitemark’, won through demonstrating a professional approach to news safety and the promotion of the highest freelance reporting ethics will serve freelances and journalism well.

This link publishes Frontline Club Freelance Safety Survey 1, showing the comments by those who left them.

Freelance Safety Survey 1 – Full

The following three links illustrates where answers between photojournalists, video journalists and newspaper stringers are significantly different.

Freelance Safety Survey 1 – Photojournalists

Freelance Safety Survey 1 – Video Journalists

Freelance Safety Survey 1 – Newspaper Stringers

N.B. In the interests of openness I am happy to receive requests to audit this survey. Note that I have removed respondents where I was satisfied that they had no actual experience working in conflicts.