www.youtube.com/watch?v=P2tbjpANfW8

‘It has always seemed to me that what I write is about humanity in extremis, pushed to the unendurable, and that it is important to tell people what really happens in wars.’ Marie Colvin, 2001

Biographer Lindsey Hilsum will be joined by Henry Porter to discuss the life and work of Marie Colvin, one of the world’s most experienced foreign correspondents of our time.

Marie Colvin was glamorous, hard-drinking, braver than the boys, with a troubled and rackety personal life. With fierce compassion and honesty, she reported from the most dangerous places in the world, fractured by conflict and genocide, going in further and staying longer than anyone else.

In Sri Lanka in 2001, Marie was hit by a grenade and lost the sight in her left eye – resulting in her trademark eye patch – and in 2012 she was killed in Syria. Like her hero, the legendary reporter Martha Gellhorn, she sought to bear witness to the horrifying truths of war, to write ‘the first draft of history’ and crucially to shine a light on the suffering of ordinary people.

Written by fellow foreign correspondent Lindsey Hilsum, this is the story of the most daring war reporter of her generation. Drawing on unpublished diaries and notebooks, and interviews with Marie’s friends, family and colleagues, In Extremis is the story of our turbulent age, and the life of a woman who defied convention.

Lindsey Hilsum  is Channel 4 News International Editor, and has covered many of the conflicts of recent years including in Syria, Ukraine and the Arab Spring – sometimes alongside Marie Colvin. She was in Baghdad for the 2003 US invasion of Iraq, and in Belgrade for the 1999 NATO bombing. In 1994, she was the only English-speaking correspondent in Rwanda when the genocide began. She has won awards from the Royal Television Society and BAFTA amongst others. Her last book, Sandstorm; Libya in the Time of Revolution, was described by the Observer as “an account with historical depth to match dramatic reportage.”

Henry Porter is a novelist and former commentator for the Observer. He is a winner of the Ian Fleming Steel Dagger award –  for Brandenburg, his novel about  the Fall of the Berlin wall,  which he covered in 1989. His latest book, Firefly, is the story of young boy on the migrant route in 2015 and is the first part of a trilogy set in the turbulent world of US and European politics. He was a friend of Marie’s and sat opposite her when they worked at the Sunday Times in the eighties. This was at a time when she was regularly picking up the phone to   Yasser Arafat and Muammar Gaddafi.

The evening will begin with a drinks reception in the Clubroom followed by a sit down dinner 8.30pm served in the Forum.

The Frontline Fund (formerly the Fixers’ Fund) is an adjunct charity of the Frontline Club which offers emergency financial assistance to local producers and their families in situations of proven distress, such as inprisonment, injury, forced exile, or death.

It was initiated by Jon Lee Anderson in 2007 following the murder of Ajmal Naqshbandi in Afghanistan.

The Fund’s disbursements are intended as a first-stop expression of material solidarity by the Frontline Club and its members on behalf of some of the most invaluable, yet vulnerable, of media workers.

Without the support of local producers, foreign journalists could not operate in the field. They are the unsung heroes of the industry and too often pay the highest price, remaining in the field once the foreign journalists have left.

Join us to support this important cause. Donations to the Frontline Fund can also be made online through the following link: http://www.beta.frontlineclub.com/donate/

Heated discussion on the issue of Europe’s crisis in handling the arrival of refugees took place at the Frontline Club on Wednesday 4 May.

From the disproportionate focus placed on the Mediterranean crossing, to the misconception that migration is negative by default and the idea that lobbying Turkey to allow Syrians to work is the answer, the panel dispelled the myths surrounding the crisis.

Patrick Kingsley, author of The New Odyssey and the Guardian‘s inaugural migration correspondent, began by speaking about his extensive reporting of the crisis. The central stories in his book range from that of a smuggler, to a civil servant, to a pregnant refugee woman. Kingsley writes of how he travelled across the Macedonian border with the pregnant woman, who believes the child she is carrying has died.

Heaven Crawley, a leading researcher of migration, said that Kingsley depicted the movement of people more completely than many correspondents before him. Media coverage often focuses only on the crossing to Greece, and yet, “the European focus on the journey across the Mediterranean is such a small part of it,” said Crawley.

Kingsley’s reporting navigates the different routes to Europe and explores the various driving factors of migration. This is important in a Europe where, Crawley said, “policy is about 15 years behind the dynamics of the movement.”

Hassan Akkad, a teacher and freelance photographer who fled the Assad regime in 2012, illustrated European ignorance on a personal level. When people hear the word refugee they expect to see a Syrian in rags, he said. “I’ve had people questioning me about why I had a cell phone.” And yet, many who have fled the war are middle class with much to contribute; Akkad is fluent in English and has studied Shakespeare.

Akkad went on to detail how he came to be in the UK. His crime, for which he suffered broken bones and solitary confinement, was protesting peacefully against Assad: “Protesting in Syria is like a suicide mission. You say goodbye to your family because you never know where you are going to end up,” he said.

L-R: Patrick Kingsley, Heaven Crawley, Lindsey Hilsum, Hassan Akkad, John Dalhuisen. Photo by Tolly Robinson

On the journey, the Syrians that Akkad travelled with were from all walks of life – and their first encounter with Europe was not a happy one. Greek marine forces launched an attack on their boat: “I felt like Syria was on a dinghy. And we were not welcome,” said Akkad. He told the audience that for now he has put his career as a teacher and photographer on hold in order to tell the story of the Syrian people, jokingly dubbing himself “the professional refugee.”

The chair, Channel 4’s international editor Lindsey Hilsum, turned the discussion towards possible solutions. In order to explain how circumstances had become so grave, John Dalhuisen of Amnesty International said that many European governments were enacting hostile asylum policies and closing their borders to prevent the far right from sweeping to power.

Dalhuisen said that this had intensified the crisis, which is almost unprecedented. “We’re looking at quite a distinct phenomenon,” he asserted.

Kingsley disagreed regarding the relative scale of the problem. “It’s actually quite small numbers,” he said. He argued that Europe, as the world’s wealthiest continent, has more than the capacity and resources to deal with the numbers arriving on its shores.

According to Kingsley, the surge in migration is a result of the poor management of legitimate passage to the UK. People were able to wait a few years in interim countries such as Turkey before being granted visas to Europe, but they could not wait the half-decade that they were forced to. “Resettlement provides a reason for people to stay put,” he said. After so long, with no legal means to achieve more prosperous and safe lives for themselves and their families, “inevitably, people decided to vote with their feet,” Kingsley added.

Crawley agreed: “The problem is at our end, we haven’t adjusted,” she said. She dismissed the arbitrary way in which European governments treat all the countries from which people are migrating as if they are the same. “What we need in policy terms is nuance,” she said. And the whole conversation around the issue needs to shift: “The idea of the end point being to stop people is nonsense,” she said.

An audience member asked about the responsibility of the wealthy neighbouring Gulf states. Akkad responded that despite presenting itself as the “mother of Islam”, Saudi Arabia had offered fleeing Syrians no support. Kingsley added: “We shouldn’t judge our response by the yardstick of the Gulf states… it doesn’t mean we shouldn’t be doing more as well.”

One journalist in the audience asked how it is possible to maintain public interest on such an ongoing humanitarian crisis. Following the surge in media attention in 2015, attention has drifted away. In the beginning, he said, Kingsley’s aim was to humanise the crisis. Now that so many journalists have told the personal and tragic tales of individual refugees, a degree of compassion fatigue has taken over. Kingsley said he had to keep taking different approaches. “In terms of keeping people engaged,” he admitted, “it’s a real struggle.”

Photos by Tolly Robinson

Words by Harriet Agerholm

On Tuesday 8 September, the Frontline Club opened its doors to some of Britain’s most esteemed journalists for a celebration of sixty years of BBC Radio 4’s From Our Own Correspondent. A panel, chaired by Owen Bennet-Jones, discussed the changing landscape of international news reporting, and reflected on the highlights of FOOC since its beginnings in 1955.

Gt. @frontlineclub tnite with some Gt. journalists on the Panel. T.B. Bcast on 17th Sept , BBC R4 @ 9am. pic.twitter.com/s6R45jBvt3

— Darran Rees (@DarranRees) September 8, 2015

The distinguished panel included Lyse Doucet, the BBC’s Chief International Correspondent; Paul Hamilos, World Features Editor at BuzzFeed; Lindsey Hilsum, Channel 4 News International Editor; and James Coomarasamy, presenter of Newshour on BBC World Service.

Hugh Levinson, senior producer with BBC Current Affairs Radio, began the evening by reminding audience members that they were a crucial part of the broadcast and encouraged questions and comments. Amongst those in attendance were Christina Lamb, eminent foreign correspondent for The Sunday Times; top radio critic Gillian Reynolds; and Tim Whewell, BBC correspondent and many time contributor to From Our Own Correspondent.

Bennet-Jones began the discussion by asking the panel to comment on the most significant changes to foreign reporting in recent years.

Lindsey Hilsum responded that technology had had the greatest impact on the field, and commented on the speed and ease with which news can be communicated whilst on assignment abroad.

A clip of Gabriel Gatehouse’s ‘Reporting From Iraq’ from 2014 was played: “I tried to keep my fear of an IS ambush at bay; to keep the images of beheaded journalists out of my mind. I focused on the now – what was going on? Had our route been blocked? Or were we lost? Neither seemed like an appealing prospect. ”

This prompted Bennet-Jones to ask the panelists: “How often do you feel frightened?”

Lyse Doucet replied, “The front line is no longer the front line, it goes through streets and houses… from all the threats kidnapping is the worst.”

L-R: James Coomarasamy, Lindsey Hilsum, Paul Hamilos and Lyse Doucet

The journalists then discussed the extent to which personal voices are appropriate in From Our Own Correspondent. An extract from Fergal Keane’s 1996 ‘Letter to Daniel’ broadcast was played, which provoked strong reactions – both positive and negative.

Keane’s broadcast was composed as he held his newborn son in his arms: “Like many foreign correspondents I know, I have lived a life that, on occasion, has veered close to the edge… Now, looking at your sleeping face, inches away from me, listening to your occasional sigh and gurgle, I wonder how I could have ever thought glory and prizes and praise were sweeter than life.”

Gillian Reynolds was called upon to give her opinion on the piece: “It made me want to vomit,” she laughed candidly.

Whilst foreign correspondents are often reporting disaster from war-torn or disaster-stricken areas of the globe, Lyse Doucet commented on the necessity of humour. “Humour is the most important language,” she said. “I use it to get through checkpoints, to understand people. We can’t just do grim.”

The discussion drew to a close with comments from both the audience and panel as to why From Our Own Correspondent has been so successful and endured for sixty years.

“It’s like a buffet,” said a member of the audience, and suggested that it feeds you with bits of news that you didn’t even know you were interested in.

Lindsey Hilsum concluded that she’d loved writing for the programme and continued to compose unpublished pieces in the style of FOOC.

The recording will be broadcast on BBC Radio 4 at 9:00 AM on Thursday 17 September.

As part of marking 60 years this autumn of Radio 4’s From Our Own Correspondent, the Frontline Club will host an event on reporting foreign news. A panel will discuss how reporting in Britain about international news and current affairs – particularly but not only by broadcast journalists – has developed over the last six decades and explore what the future holds in a world of social media and digital correspondents.

The panel:
Owen Bennett-Jones, from the BBC’s World Service (chair)
Lindsey Hilsum, Channel 4’s international editor
Paul Hamilos, world features editor at Buzzfeed UK
James Coomarasamy, presenter on BBC World Service
and Lyse Doucet, the BBC’s chief international correspondent.

Club members and guests are welcome and encouraged to contribute to the discussion. The event will be broadcast on Radio 4 on Thursday 17 September at 9:00 AM and on the BBC World Service.

There is no charge for this event. It will start promptly at 6pm – the event is being recorded for broadcast so I’m afraid if you arrive after the start time you will not be permitted to enter.

This event is organised by BBC Radio 4.

On Wednesday 17 September, a panel chaired by Channel 4 News’ international editor Lindsey Hilsum, came together to discuss the current plight of Libya; what has gone wrong since the 2011 revolution, whether it really is on the brink of becoming a failed state, and what role the international community should play in pulling Libya away from this fate.

The discussion began with an attempt to untangle the complexities of Libya’s warring factions, which are divided by regional, religious and political differences. These difficulties were described by Hilsum as “sort of three-dimensional chess”. Hassan al-Amin, a human rights activist and founder of Libya al-Mostakbal (The Future Libya) observed:

“I don’t really call it a revolution; I think to me it is an uprising, because revolution, usually, would have leaders, would have some thoughts, some ideas, some kind of organisation, but this didn’t. We have people coming from everywhere.”

The panel agreed that the blanket use of the term ‘Islamist’ was, in many cases, both inaccurate and problematic, creating unnecessary divisions within the Libyan people.Libya Correspondent for The Guardian Chris Stephen, expressed similar sentiments, adding that, “This [recent] election has simplified things. You now have two sides, those with the parliament and those against the parliament.”

Next, the problem of the ‘Gaddafi vacuum’ was addressed. The panel discussed the difficulties that Libya has faced in rebuilding a nation in his wake. Huda Abuzeid, a filmmaker and TV producer, reiterated that:

“Gaddafi was the state. Once you removed Gaddafi, there was no state. What the failure has been is building that state. I think to say it’s a failed state after three years is, really, unfair.”

The Political Isolation Law, implemented in May 2013, was criticised for exacerbating this problem. Hilsum pointed out that, “For 42 years you have one man in charge, and if you’re going to work in government there’s no-one else to work for.”

The isolation law, therefore, has created a dearth of experienced government officials in Libya. Ghazi Gheblawi, editor of el-Kaf online newspaper, pointed out a secondary consequence of this law:

“Lots of people who were active in government and were doing good things . . . found themselves overnight just isolated completely.”

The panel also touched upon the role that the international community has played. Hassan al-Amin criticised international diplomacy efforts: “They don’t have any coherent strategy; what they have is, in my opinion, incompetence on all levels.”

This ‘incompetence’, according to al-Amin, was due in part to the failure of NATO countries to work together after the 2011 revolution; instead, they started going individually their own way. Al-Amin also emphasised that the failure of the international community to work with Libya was a double-edged sword:

“The Libyans . . . have never come up with a clear plan, a road map for what Libya actually wants from the international community, and at the same time the international community never actually helped Libya in trying to come up with some ideas.”

However, the panel agreed that it was too early in Libya’s development to write off the nation, with Abuzeid praising the country’s ‘amazing’ civil society.

Thanks to @frontlineclub and @reportingLibya @almostakbal @hudduh @lindseyhilsum for an energetic inspiring panel on #Libya

— Ghazi Gheblawi | غازي القبلاوي (@Gheblawi) September 17, 2014

Watch and listen back here:

On February 19 at the Frontline Club, a panel chaired by international editor at Channel 4 News Lindsey Hilsum, discussed the current state of rebel fractions and the rise of ISIS in Syria.

Kim Sengupta, Lindsey Hilsum and Aymenn Jawad Al-Tamimi discuss Syria and ISIS at the Frontline Club

Hilsum started of by asking what happened to the FSA, which was so prominent during the first months of the Syrian rebellion?

Kim Sengupta, defence and diplomatic correspondent at The Independent said:

“There are more brigades, battalions that nominally at least will say that they belong to the FSA but as an organisation it is still very much based in Istanbul. It’s got probably more influence than before but not an awful lot on the ground.”

How did ISIS (Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant) rise to become one of the most prominent groups?

Aymenn Jawad Al-Tamimi is a student at Brasenose College, Oxford University focusing on developments in Syria and Iraq:

“On the ground what happened was that Jabhat al-Nusra people accepted [leader of ISIS Abu Bakr] al-Baghdadi’s argument [that al-Nusra was merely an extension of ISI and therefore should merge] and accordingly they switched over from Jabhat al-Nusra to declare themselves ISIS.”

Al-Tamimi explained the ideology of ISIS:

“Ultimately they [ISIS and al-Nusra] share the same ideological program. ISIS emphasises much more the goal of establishing a caliphate…Beginning in Iraq and Syria which then should not only encompass the entire Muslim world but the whole world, including London and such places… This globalist emphasis, which ISIS does, in contrast with al-Nusra, means that this appeals so much to foreign fighters.”

http://twitter.com/Alexwhi/status/436260104787484672

Raffaello Pantucci, senior research fellow at the Royal United Services Institute for Defence and Security Studies (RUSI) said that many foreign fighters are unaware of the complicated environment they are going into:

“One of the things that isn’t so clear to individuals that seem to be going out there to fight is I think they miss the point about how confusing a battle field this really is and how shifting it really is. And how these allegiances on the ground are changing almost daily.

But why ISIS and not other groups?

Pantucci:

“…What’s worrying is that ISIS has a more globalist rhetoric… a lot of these people who are going out there are not going…because they want to become involved in terrorist activity and have any intention in coming back here to conduct some sort of terrorist attack… but what’s worrying is the groups they are joining and the people they will meet … may have different ideas and may be able to persuade them to have these different ideas.”

Lindsey Hilsum, Aymenn Jawad Al-Tamimi and Malik Al-Abdeh discuss ISIS and Syria at the Frontline Club

Malik Al-Abdeh, a British-Syrian freelance journalist based between London and Antakya, attempted to simplify the confusing environment:

“If you go to these places you realise that it’s all about money, it’s about local power brokers. How else do you explain why al-Nusra and ISIS don’t like each other? They’re two gangs that don’t get along.”

@Alexwhi: #Syria is like wild west, and extremist Islamist #ISIS group brings order to areas it controls, @malikalabdeh says @frontlineclub

— Hammad (@hammadsarfraz) February 19, 2014

A question from the audience asked what should the west and other powers be doing?

Al-Tamimi:

“It’s all just become so fragmented now…I think that either you accept the idea of wanting a total victory and then you’ve got to have some kind of international force brought in in the aftermath, to train some kind of army to bring some kind of stability and that will take a very very long time…a timescale of decades…or are you going to go with a de facto partition of the country and some kind of ceasefire?”

Sengupta said that it is actually too late for the west to intervene; the time has passed:

“If you don’t want to support a population against a regime, don’t entice them to rise up which is what Britain and France, in particular did… have been doing consistently and then they have failed abjectly to support what was left of the so-called secular groups and moderate groups and thus we have seen the triumph of ISIS and other extremist groups.”

Pantucci:

“I think that there was a moment where the west could actually do something to affect a difference, I think that moment has passed quite a long time ago and I don’t know if there is a huge amount that they could actually control about this situation anymore.

“…I think the one plan that they’ve got is how do we mitigate the threat that’s going to come back to us. And that’s why … the focus here is on the foreign fighters.. I don’t think there’s a plan for an end state of how we want it to look. I think they want to make it as less bad as possible.”

Watch and listen to the full discussion below:

L-R: Mukesh Kapila, James Copnall, Lindsey Hilsum, Heather Pagano and Thomas Mawan Muortat discuss South Sudan.

The audience packed out the Frontline Club for the first event of the year on 8 January, a testament to the subject that has been dominating international headlines for the last few weeks – the crisis in South Sudan. A panel of experts from different fields, chaired by Channel 4 international editor Lindsey Hilsum, discussed the current fighting in the world’s youngest country, each offering valuable opinions on where it came from and where it’s going.

The BBC’s South Sudan and Sudan correspondent, James Copnall, gave some context to the recent fighting and imparted what he has seen on the ground first hand. When Hilsum asked if it was an attempted coup that started the fighting, as President Salva Kiir has claimed, or a mutiny amongst the presidential guard, as alleged by former vice-president Riek Machar, Copnall said it is still too early to tell, but “the key objective is to get both sides to stop fighting and at least start talking.”

Heather Pagano from Medecins Sans Frontieres (MSF) added a humanitarian perspective: “The situation is quite concerning… the speed with which everything changes on the ground, which makes it incredibly difficult to plan a proper aid response, especially in such a big country with very little logistical capacity.”

“I’ll share with you MSF’s main humanitarian concerns at the moment,” Pagano added. “In Juba, we are working in a UN camp where there is 30,000 displaced. It is so cramped that people are taking turns sleeping at night. A physic on the team worked out that the population density there is 10x the population density in Mumbai.”

MSF’s other concerns for those in refugee camps are ethnic based attacks, a lack of water (“wells are running dry by 10am”), and a high risk of disease outbreak.

Hilsum asked Thomas Mawan Mourtat, a South Sudanese political analyst, how South Sudan has come to this so quickly after the jubilation of independence in 2011. He explained that there were many underlying factors that led to this: “The population feels it has be let down and agitated by the ruling party. It was not surprising to many people that it blew up – the extent of the violence was a surprise, but people were feeling something was going to happen.”

Professor of Global Affairs Mukesh Kapila, who prior to teaching at the University of Manchester was the UN Resident and Humanitarian Coordinator for Sudan, pointed out that history suggests new countries go through a level of instability.

“The international community needs to be tolerant. The idea that you could impose a western style democracy, a winner takes all approach, and the rituals of a mature state and expect everything to work is complete nonsense.”

“Peace and society is built from the bottom up, not top down. You need a much more grassroots approach, local democracy and local governance.”

Mourtat agreed with Kapila that a resolution could be best reached through the grassroots, specifically through the strengthening of local councils: “During the war, one of the most successful campaigns was organising grassroots district councils.” He explained, “the SPLA has lost its way since it came into power. This local administration has been lost and that needs to be re-established.”

When an audience member asked if more UN peacekeepers were needed, the former Sudan UN coordinator, Kapila, went as far to call the current peacekeeping response “abominable”.

“If you look at the case of Darfur, the biggest UN peacekeeping operation” said Kapila, “the situation is as bad as ever. Why are [global taxpayers] paying a billion dollars a year, yet there is ongoing violence. How is a UN peacekeeper force going to bring about peace between a sovereign government and an armed insurgency?”

He reasoned: “Spend it on trying to build grassroots to build community reconciliation and community peace building capacities.”

https://soundcloud.com/frontlineclub/first-wednesday-south-sudan

Your wonderful and kind messages mean so much to us, as has your friendship, council and support over so many years. There is no prize in our trade that we could ever value as much as your belief in us.

– Vaughan and Pranvera Smith

 

Thank you to Stewart Purvis, Richard Gizbert, Tina Carr, Emma Beals, Allan Little, Mani, Stuart Hughes, Richard Sambrook, Jon Snow, Marina Litvinenko, Martin Bell, Tom Fenton, Anthony Loyd, Lyse Doucet, Bill Neely, Lindsey Hilsum, Charles Glass, John G Morris, Salim Amin, Liz Palmer Gary Knight, Jon Lee Anderson, Jeremy Bowen, Matt Frei and Jean-Jacques Gonfier.

The Frontline Club hosted an evening of reflections marking the publication of Granta 125: After the War on 17 October. Two correspondents shared their personal views on developments on the ground, after the battles are fought and the camera teams have moved on to cover other wars.

From left to right: Roma Tearne, Frances Harrison and Lindsey Hilsum

Roma Tearne, Sri Lankan artist, filmmaker and novelist, spoke to Lindsey Hilsum, International Editor for Channel 4 News who covered the Rwandan genocide and Frances Harrison, former BBC Correspondent in Sri Lanka.

Watch it back and listen to the podcast:

https://soundcloud.com/frontlineclub/granta-125-after-the-war-with