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Home , Alisyn Camerota, Anja Niedringhaus, Arwa Damon, BBC Pashto, Brian Stelter, Caliphate (podcast)

MONTHLY NEWSLETTER I April-May 2018

OPC Awards Dinner Honors Women INSIDE and Exceptional International Journalism Annual Awards Dinner Photos 2-3, 5 her killer was sentenced to life in EVENT RECAP prison. Her parents, Ingrid and Award Winners 6-7 Joachim Wall, lit the Candle of by donna m. airoldi Event Recap: Remembrance for who oreign correspondents PEN America Report have been imprisoned, killed or ha- on China Censors 8 gathered on April 26 to rassed while doing their jobs. celebrate their profession and F “We wish that we could sit over People Column 9-12 honor those who have persevered at our table as proud parents and in uncovering the truth despite the Press Freedom see our daughter receive an award 13 increasing challenges journalists Update for her stories,” said Ingrid Wall. face when doing their jobs. “We wish that every in New Books 14 “There is unfortunately no sign the world could do very important that reporting abroad is becoming MOORE STEVE Q&A: work without risking their lives. Louise Boyle 15 any safer or any easier. There were And we wish for the next year José Díaz-Balart, presenter. at least 50 documented deaths of that there won’t be any need for a journalists last year, one of the remembrance candle.” respondent for and Af- worst years on record. Several Another of the evening’s ghanistan for The , hundred more have been jailed to themes focused on women on the received the prestigious President’s stop their reporting,” said keynote frontlines. But as OPC President Award “for courage under fire speaker , managing Deidre Depke noted, women have and a deep commitment to bring- editor of The Times. “We long been reporting from conflict ing light to dark places.” She was Click here need the OPC now more than ever zones as correspondents, photog- attacked on April 4, 2014 by a to see photos and to keep our attention focused on raphers and producers, “and aside gunman while reporting in eastern video clips from the risks our colleagues are taking from the recognition they’re just . AP photographer the Annual Awards and to celebrate their best work.” getting now, we have all known Anja Niedringhaus, who was with Dinner. One of those journalists killed that for decades they’ve been the her, was killed. Gannon has en- in 2017 was OPC member Kim backbone of great reporting.” dured several surgeries since then, Wall. The day before the awards, Kathy Gannon, senior cor- Continued on Page 4

Steve Coll Examines US in South Asia in ‘Directorate S’ OPC book night at Club Quarters Coll, who serves as dean of the while Pakistan was EVENT RECAP on March 22. the Graduate School of Journal- also a supposed ally in conflicts by chad bouchard Coll’s book, Directorate S: ism at Columbia University, said against extremists. The C. I. A. And America’s Secret Directorate S (a name “[Directorate S] was well ubris and a shallow Wars In Afghanistan And Pakistan, given to the group by known to the Americans on depth of cultural under- 2001-2016, focuses on the covert U.S. intelligence) had Click here September 11th, because in standing have marred U.S. H action arm of Pakistan’s Inter-Ser- cells that supported to see video clips the 1980s the U.S. collabo- foreign policy in Pakistan, Af- vices Intelligence agency, or ISI, a Islamist militias and from the rated with ISI to provide ghanistan and over decades book night. shadowy group that was both ally was covertly training guns and ammunition to the of history, journalist and author with and opposition to the CIA. and trying to legitimize Steve Coll explained during an Continued on Page 8

1 1 OPC Annual Awards Dinner

Joseph Kahn, managing editor of , gives keynote remarks.

Kathy Gannon, senior correspondent for Pakistan and Afghani- stan for the AP, accepts this year’s OPC Presdent’s Award. PHOTOS: STEVE MOORE STEVE PHOTOS:

OPC President Deidre Depke, left, with Ingrid and Joachim Wall, center, and OPC Executive Director Patricia Kranz during the ceremonial lighting of the Candle of Remembrance.

Left to right: Jay Davies, Leon Neal and Pancho Bernasconi. Deidre Depke, left, and Patricia Kranz.

April 2018 2 Sarah Lubman, chair of the dinner committee.

Steve Kroft, left, with Matt Lev.

Left to right: Jonathan Ade, Ed Ou, Elise Cocker and Aurora Almendral.

Deborah Amos

Azmat Khan, left, and Basim Razzo.

Past OPC Presidents: Allan Dodds Frank, David Andelman, Michael Ser- rill, Deidre Depke (current), Marcus Mabry and William J. Holstein.

April-May 2018 3 ‘Awards Dinner’ Continued From Page 1 and Depke noted that she was in town this week for her sixteenth. The crowd gave her a roaring standing ovation. Gannon thanked OPC and noted her inspiration from a new genera- tion of journalists. “I listened as one person spoke of his gratitude to those who share their stories, and truly my heart skipped a beat, because for me that’s the essence of who we are and what we do,” she said. “That is why I love this job. Because it allows me to give a voice to those who struggle to be heard.” Along with others who cited attacks on the press around the world, and at home from our own president, Gannon noted the insults targeted toward the media “by the powerful, but I feel we have risen to the occa- sion,” she said. “I feel it has inspired us to dig deeper, look closer and reconnect to the real reasons why we chose this profession. Whether it’s the suffering by the Rohingya Muslims driven from their homes, Yemenis tortured Left to right: Doug Jehl, John Daniszewski and Patricia Kranz. in secret prisons, or women killed in the name of honor, and those who would kill them, and of women assaulted by powerful men who thought that power alone entitled them and would guarantee their silence. But “My goal was to evoke viewers to feel empathy for those in exile. what we do when we tell these stories is we reveal awe-inspiring cour- They’re not simply collateral damage. They’re individuals with shattered age of those who choose to speak out.” hopes and dreams still choosing life. And I wanted people to really see This year’s 22 awards were selected from 430 entries and reviewed them,” said Guzy. “It is with deep humility that I stand here in tribute to by more than 90 judges. Three awards each were given for stories on the people in Mosul and all other innocents caught in conflicts, and [who defeating ISIS in and , and on coverage detailing the conse- are] emerging from those atrocities with resilience and even grace. That quences war has on civilians. Additional regions and conflicts repre- is the purest definition of courage.” sented included the Rohingya exodus from Myanmar, the drug war in the Ed Ou and Aurora Almendral won the David A. Andelman and Pa- Philippines, a housing crisis in Mexico, and more. mela Title Award for best international reporting in the broadcast media Host José Díaz-Balart, news anchor for Noticias Telemundo and showing a concern for the human condition for “The Kill List: The Bru- NBC News, presented the awards. tal Drug War in the Philippines.” The Associated Press and led all media outlets with three “Ed and I wanted to create a portrait of how [President] Duterte has OPC awards each. AP won the prestigious Hal Boyle Award for best built complex narratives of denial and justification, and to show how cit- newspaper or news service reporting from abroad as its team chronicled izens of a country are willing to compromise their morals for what they the human rights violations against the in Myanmar. have been convinced is for their greater good,” Almendral said. Reuters journalists , Andrew R.C. Marshall and Man- She added that they could not have done their work without the uel Mogato and their team won the first-ever Roy Rowan Award for best undertaker, “who believed the killings needed to be documented, and investigative reporting with an exposé on the murderous drug crackdown allowed us to do our work,” and the family of the dead man, who un- conducted by the Philippine police. Rowan, a former OPC president, derstood we were documenting what was happening. “The killings are passed away in 2016 after a legendary 70-year journalism career. going on to this day. Duterte may be getting away with it now, but the “My colleagues spent 18 months investigating Duterte’s War,” said victims’ families told me they believe justice will come for him later, Baldwin. “We knew which neighborhoods the killers frequented. We and that work like ours will stand for what really is happening in the knew the GPS coordinates of their kills. We knew they mostly came at Philippines.” night and killed with close range head shots. We also knew most of the The evening also included a fundraiser for the OPC’s Freelancer killers were Philippine national police. But knowing it and proving it are Fund, which supports those reporting around the world who often cannot two very different things.” get their reporting costs met, or who need assistance with OPC member- Baldwin said that combining street reporting with data reporting ship. Attendees contributed more than $22,000. helped to name the killers. “What was great for us and galling for the po- Bringing a bit of levity to the event was Clay Bennett, cartoonist lice was the data we used to name the killers was their own,” she said. for the Chattanooga Times Free Press, and winner of the Thomas Nast Another new honor, the Kim Wall Award, for best digital storytell- Award for best cartoons on international affairs. Images of his work – fo- ing, went to William Booth, Sufian Taha and Linda Davidson fromThe cused mainly on President Trump – brought giggles to the crowd while Washington Post for their piece “Occupied,” which detailed the military they were displayed on the screen behind him as he thanked journalists occupation story from three Palestinians. Wall’s parents presented the “who cover the most dangerous beats in our business.” award. “You report objectively, and I interpret it subjectively,” he said. “If “For our project, there was one question we wanted to ask,” said the mission of a journalist is to hold up a mirror to society, the one an Taha. “What does it feel like for a Palestinian to be occupied?” editorial cartoonist uses is like of those you find in a carnival funhouse. Carol Guzy of Zuma Press won the Robert Capa Gold Medal Award I couldn’t do that job if not for the noble and downright dangerous work for her intimate and sensitive photographs in the “Scars of Mosul, the that you do. Without you there would be no me. So, you’re to blame.” v Legacy of ISIS.”

April 2018 4 Left to right: Han Tjan, left, Bronwyn Staff, Brian Byrd and Maria Jannace. and Marcus Mabry.

Left to right: Joseph Kahn, Left to right: Suzanne Barlyn, Rebecca Blumenstein Nadia Damouni and and Shannon Wu. Sarah Lubman.

Left to right: Kayce Freed Jennings, Andrew Metz, Raney Aronson-Rath Linda Fasulo and Jordan Kronick.

April-May 2018 5 CITATION Ian Pannell, Matt McGarry, Rym Momtaz, Nicky DeBlois and Jenna Millman ABC News

STEVE MOORE STEVE “The War Against ISIS”

2017 AWARDS AND WINNERS THE EDWARD R. MURROW AWARD THE HAL BOYLE AWARD CITATION Best TV, video or documentary interpretation Best newspaper, news service or digital Mohammad Ponir Hossain, Danish Siddiqui, of international affairs less than one hour reporting from abroad Hannah McKay, Damir Sagolj and Cathal McNaughton Raney Aronson-Rath, James Jones, Ol- Associated Press Staff Reuters ivier Sarbil, Dan Edge and Andrew Metz “Rohingya Exodus” “Rohingya Flee Violence in Myanmar” FRONTLINE PBS in association with Channel 4 CITATION “Mosul” Clare Baldwin, Andrew R.C. Marshall, THE FEATURE and Reuters team PHOTOGRAPHY AWARD CITATION Reuters Best published photographic reporting from Steve Kroft, Draggan Mihailovich, Laura “Duterte’s War” abroad requiring exceptional courage and Dodd and Matthew Lev enterprise CBS “Isle of Eigg” THE BOB CONSIDINE AWARD Kevin Frayer Best newspaper, news service or digital Getty Images interpretation of international affairs “The Harrowing Exodus of Rohingya THE PETER JENNINGS AWARD Muslims to Bangladesh” Best TV, video or documentary about New York Times Staff international affairs one hour or longer “North Korea, and the Unthinkable” CITATION Meridith Kohut Evgeny Afineevsky, Den Tolmor CITATION The New York Times and Aaron I. Butler “As Venezuela Collapses, Children Borzou Daragahi HBO are Dying of Hunger” Buzzfeed “Cries from Syria” “Iran and the US at a Crossroads” CITATION THE LOWELL THOMAS AWARD Michael Kirk, Mike Wiser, Jim Gilmore, Philip THE ROBERT CAPA GOLD MEDAL Best radio, audio, or podcast news or inter- Bennett, David E. Hoffman AWARD pretation of international affairs and Raney Aronson-Rath Best published photographic reporting from PBS FRONTLINE abroad requiring exceptional courage and Gregory Warner, Laura Heaton, Marianne “Putin’s Revenge” enterprise McCune, Michael May and Jess Jiang NPR Carol Guzy “The Congo We Listen To,” an episode of THE ED CUNNINGHAM AWARD the Rough Translation podcast” Zuma Press Best magazine reporting in print or digital on “Scars of Mosul, the Legacy of ISIS” an international story CITATION CITATION Marlon Bishop, Maria Hinojosa, Nadia Reiman Azmat Khan and Anand Gopal and Stephanie Lebow Ivor Prickett The New York Times Magazine Latino USA The New York Times “The Uncounted” “What ISIS Left Behind” “A Border Drawn in Blood” CITATION THE OLIVIER REBBOT AWARD THE DAVID KAPLAN AWARD Ben Mauk, Laura Kasinof, George Butler Best photographic news reporting from Best TV or video spot news reporting from and Diàna Markosian abroad in any medium abroad Virginia Quarterly Review and the Pulitzer Center on Crisis Reporting Carlos Garcia Rawlins and Carlos Barria and “Paths to Refuge” Reuters CNN “Venezuela Marred by Violence” “Fall of ISIS”

April-May 2018 6 THE THOMAS NAST AWARD CITATION Richard Marosi Best cartoons on international affairs Cynthia Gorney, Amy Toensing Los Angeles Times and Kathryn Carlson “Mexico’s Housing Debacle: Clay Bennett National Geographic A Failed Vision” Chattanooga Times Free Press “Life After Loss” CITATION CITATION Almudena Toral, Maye Primera, Oscar Mar- Kevin Kallaugher THE DAVID A. ANDELMAN tinez and Carlos Martinez The Economist AND PAMELA TITLE AWARD Univision News Digital and El Faro Best international reporting in the broadcast “From Migrants to Refugees: The New THE MORTON FRANK AWARD media showing a concern for the human Plight of Central Americans” Best magazine international business news condition reporting in print or digital Ed Ou and Aurora Almendral THE KIM WALL AWARD Monte Reel NBC Left Field Best story or series of stories on internation- Bloomberg Businessweek “The Kill List: The Brutal Drug War al affairs using digital storytelling techniques “How to Rebuild Puerto Rico” in the Philippines” William Booth, Sufian Taha and Linda CITATION Davidson THE MALCOLM AWARD Jordan Kronick, David Scott, Fernando Vil- Best international business news reporting legas and Daniel Litke “Occupied” in newspapers, news services or digital HBO Real Sports with Bryant Gumbel “The Strongman – Ramzan Kadyrov” CITATION Paritosh Bansal, Tom Lasseter, Aditya Aryn Baker, Lynsey Addario Kalra, Duff Wilson and team and Francesca Trianni Reuters THE JOE AND LAURIE DINE AWARD TIME magazine, supported by the Pulitzer “The Philip Morris Files” Best international reporting in any medium Center on Crisis Reporting and Merck dealing with human rights for Mothers CITATION “Finding Home” Lauren Etter, Benjamin Elgin, Sarah Frier Maggie Michael and Michael Riley The Associated Press Bloomberg News “In Yemen, Human Rights THE ROY ROWAN AWARD “Facebook and the Assault on Democracy” a Casualty of War” Best investigative reporting in any medium on an international story CITATION THE CORNELIUS RYAN AWARD Dionne Searcey and Sarah Topol Clare Baldwin, Andrew R.C. Marshall, Best non-fiction book on international affairs The New York Times Manuel Mogato and Reuters team “Hell’s Children” “Duterte’s War” Suzy Hansen Farrar, Straus and Giroux CITATION Notes on a Foreign Country: An American THE WHITMAN BASSOW AWARD Iona Craig Abroad in a Post-American World Best reporting in any medium on interna- The Intercept tional environmental issues “Death in Al Ghayil: Women and Children CITATION in Yemeni Village Recall Horror of Trump’s Joshua Kurlantzick Sam Evans-Brown and Hannah McCarthy ‘Highly Successful’ SEAL Raid” Simon & Schuster Powerline, New Hampshire Public Radio A Great Place to Have a War: America “Outside/In” podcast in Laos and the Birth of a Military CIA BEST COMMENTARY CITATION Best commentary in any medium on Douglas Fox, Laurent Ballesta international news THE MADELINE DANE ROSS and Camille Seaman AWARD National Geographic Gideon Rachman Best international reporting in the broadcast “Crisis on the Ice” and “Under ” Financial Times v media showing a concern for the human condition THE ROBERT SPIERS BENJAMIN Associated Press Staff AWARD “Collapse of the : Triumph Best reporting in any medium on Latin and Tragedy in Mosul” America April-May 2018 7 PEN America Releases Report on Social Media Crackdown in China James Tager, senior manager of free expres- EVENT RECAP sion programs at PEN America, presenting key findings. by chad bouchard He said hopes that the internet would be- ust days after Chinese President Xi Jin- come an ungovernable space for free in China ping lifted term limits to become “presi- have not come to pass. Likewise, the rise of Jdent for life,” PEN America, an advocacy social media over the last decade has failed to group devoted to freedom of expression pry open those doors. around the world, released a damning report He said China has enlisted Western social about tightening restrictions on free expression media companies, “outsourcing” censorship and social media. On March 13, the OPC and and tightened restrictions by making closed- PEN America hosted a panel to discuss the door deals. report and the state of social media expression. The government uses a potent combina- Left to right: Clay Shirky, Alexa Olesen, Moderating the panel was OPC Associate tion of restrictions on social media companies Kaiser Kuo, Edward Wong, James Tager Governor Minky Worden, director of themselves, along with technological controls. and Minky Worden. global initiatives at Human Rights He said the report outlines “serious signifi- “It’s a strange moment to be in right now, Click here Watch. She said there are more cant concerns that any company trying to enter to watch video than 770 million internet users this space will enable and facilitate censorship where we’re very concerned about Chinese clips from the in China, accounting for over of Chinese users.” internet companies now actually out innovat- program. half of the country’s population, He added that China sees itself as a care- ing American ones.” and while social media is tightly taker of cyber security and information and Alexa Olesen, a Brooklyn-based writer who controlled, it is also thriving. uses this “Cyber sovereignty” to justify cen- focuses mainly on China, said Chinese internet “Due to constraints on what Chinese sorship. Authors of the report worry that the users used to have a lot of latitude about what citizens can see and read, the censorship that global discussion of “fake news” will be used they could post online and on social media. is pervasive is also invisible. That is, you as a poison pill to justify more restrictions. “Who would have thought that the Hu can’t look for something you don’t know is Kaiser Kuo, co-founder of Sinica podcast, a Jintao era would be, in retrospect, a high water missing.” current affairs podcast in Beijing, said a once- mark for free expression in China?” The government restricts dissent with laws, commonly held notion that China is incapable She said new laws over the last few years technology and ideology – all efforts that Xi of innovation because of its restrictions has have criminalized online content that subverts has intensified over the last couple of years. turned on its head in 2016. Continued on Page 14

‘Steve Coll’ “It was a swollen institution that had a certain hubris about itself, Continued From Page 1 and after the Americans left in the early 90s, ISI decided to apply the methodologies that it had piloted with the CIA against the Soviets to the Mujahideen to fight against the Soviet occupation of Afghanistan.” Kashmiri war,” he said. ISI collaborated with al-Qaeda to go after Kash- The book picks up at the end of Coll’s first book on the topic, the miri militants on the border of Afghanistan, and then looked to a long Pulitzer Prize-winning Ghost Wars, which covers the period leading up term asymmetric strategy against India that included Islamist groups to the 9-11 attacks. Coll outlined several phases of what he called the Americans’ “failure To illustrate the fickle nature of the U.S. relationship with ISA and to understand ISI.” He said the only members of the Bush administra- Pakistan, Coll recounted an anecdote that followed the Bush administra- tion’s cabinet who had personal experience in Afghanistan or Pakistan tion’s declared that nations must be “either with us or against us” in the were Colin Powell and Richard Armitage at the State Department, and war on terrorism. As Pakistan declared its solidarity with the U.S., the their vision of the region was “distorted by their sense that the Pakistan leader of Directorate S, Colonel Imam, was flying on a plane to Islam- army was the most important potential partner,” he said, and by the abad from Afghanistan, where he had been aiding the Taliban, along with desire to believe that Pervez Musharraf was sincere in flipping sides and the CIA station chief. abandoning the Taliban. He reassured the station chief that Pakistan was fully on board to help The second phase was one of distraction, caused by the , the Americans. As soon as he gets off the plane and visits the Taliban’s when the administration turned security in Afghanistan over to NATO ambassador to Pakistan, Abdul Salam Zaeef, and “bursts into tears when partners as a way to concentrate their forces and attention in Iraq. greeting him at the door and, saying ‘I can’t believe the treachery of us Pakistan and ISI saw the U.S. choosing India as its strategic partner flipping to the American side.’” for the 21st century, and its relations with Pakistan as transactional, he “That encapsulated in one day the ISI, they were capable of manipu- said. Finally, by the time Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice started lating the CIA and the Taliban simultaneously. That was their craft,” he to get a grasp of the situation around 2006, Coll said, the Situation said. Room was so tied up in Iraq that it was not receptive to warnings about During the 1980s, Coll said, ISI was built into a state within the Paki- Afghanistan. stani state because of the scale of American and Saudi subsidies, which “There was a blindness. Some of it willful, some of it incidental to were way out of line with anything the Pakistani defense budget could the Iraq distraction. By 2008, the US system had some to understand that have accommodated before. April-May 2018 8 PEOPLE By Chad Bouchard and Farwa Zaidi WELCOME N E W MEMBERS OPC SCHOLARS Ou Finn Freedman winner, Ed Ou, winner of the 2007 Dan El- Marina Walker Phoebe Leila Barghouty don Scholarship, won the Canadian Guevara, and her Freelance Screen Award for cinematography colleagues Frederik Brooklyn with colleague Kitra Cahana for the Obermaier and Spen- Active Resident, Young (29 and under) documentary “Dancing Toward the cer Woodman from Light” for CBC News. Ou is now a The International Livia Hengel Consortium of Inves- Freelance video journalist at NBC News. The Rome documentary showed how young tigative Journalists Active Overseas, Young people use dance for healing and won the Polk Awards’ (29 and under) preventing depression in the isolated Financial Reporting Sudarsan Raghavan northern community of Nunavut, Award for “The Para- The Washington Post where suicide is alarmingly common. dise Papers,” which Cairo Bureau Chief Ou also won this year’s David A. centers on a massive Cairo Andelman and Pamela Title Award with AP in the Cairo bureau. leak of financial docu- Active Overseas along with his colleague, Aurora Al- ments that shed light on the shady Marcus Rowan mendral, for a program about Presi- After Sara Dadouch’s OPC Foun- realm of offshore finance. President Berkshire Interests, Inc. dent Duterte’s brutal drug war in the dation fellowship in the Reuters WINNERS Dallas, TX Philippines. bureau in , the 2016 Emanuel Associate Non-Resident R. Freedman Scholarship winner OPC Governor David Furst, inter- Tom Finn, the H.L Stevenson Fel- secured a full-time position with the national photo editor for The New Emily Schultheis Freelance lowship winner in 2013, is back news wire. She is now a correspon- York Times, was named Newspaper Berlin with Reuters, now covering FX in dent in the Reuters bureau in Riyadh, Visual Editor of the Year in the 75th Active Overseas, Young London. Tom previously worked for alongside 2013 Roy Rowan Scholar- Annual Pictures of the Year Inter- (29 and under) Reuters in the Qatar bureau. He was ship winner Stephen Kalin, who is national Competition. He also won an OPC Foundation fellow in the Re- the senior correspondent there. second place in the Online News and uters bureau in Cairo and had previ- Issue Story Editing category, and ously worked for the Yemen Times. 2005 David Schweisberg winner third place in Print Newspaper Visual Emily Steel and her colleagues at Editing, as well as an “Award of Ex- Pete Vernon, the 2016 Theo Wil- The New York Times won the Pulitzer cellence” mention for Online Feature son Scholar, wrote an extensive pro- Prize for Public Service. The Times Story Editing. Adam Ferguson of the file of CNN’s . Stelter shared the award this year with The Times was named Photographer of hosts the media news show Reliable New Yorker. Steel and her report- the Year. The award for Newspaper Sources and serves as the network’s ing partner Michael Schmidt wrote Photographer of the Year went to senior media correspondent. Ver- stories that brought down Magnus Wennman of the Swedish non wrote about Stelter’s sense of star Bill O’Reilly and exposed sexual paper Aftonbladet. urgency and near-obsession about harassment at Vice Media as part of covering media in an era marked a series that won the award. Steel OPC Governor Vivienne Walt has by constant media-bashing from told Recode that the power of the won an award for international re- President Trump. He quoted Stelter reporting on Fox News “wasn’t just porting from the Society of American as saying the “coordinated campaign a person who was accused of bad Business Editors and Writers. Walt’s against journalism” did not start with behavior at the top who was getting piece, “Welcome to Tomorrow the Trump administration, but “dates away with it, but it was this entire Land,” examines Estonia’s transfor- back decades. He just poured a huge system and this entire culture that mation into a high-tech vision of the amount of gasoline on the already was really corrupt.” future, with buzzing delivery drones, burning fire.” Vernon is currently a government services going online CJR Delacorte Fellow. 2010 David Schweisberg winner and access to the Internet declared Jenny Gross has been named a as a basic human right. She wrote Sam McNeil, Walter and Betsy Knight-Bagehot Fellow in econom- the piece for FORTUNE in April last Cronkite Scholarship winner in ics and business journalism for the year. The judges lauded the story’s 2014, is changing positions within 2018-2019 academic year at Colum- contrasts “between showing how far The Associated Press from Tunisia bia’s Graduate School of Journalism. Estonia has come from Soviet-era to the Beijing bureau. He worked in Jenny is currently the U.K. politics backwater with magnificent medieval Beijing last summer and met 2017 correspondent for the Wall Street architecture to rocketing straight Fritz Beebe Fellowship winner Yi- Journal in London, where she cov- into the future with specific, solid ling Liu, who was there on an OPC ers Brexit and national security. She examples.” Foundation fellowship. McNeil, will previously freelanced from Johan- now work with Dake Kang, 2016 nesburg for the Associated Press and Clare Baldwin, Andrew R.C. Fritz Beebe winner, who started in the WSJ. Marshall and Manuel Mogato of the bureau earlier this year. McNeil Reuters have won the 2018 Pulitzer The Foundation’s 2005 Emanuel had an OPC Foundation fellowship Prize in International reporting for April-May 2018 9 up dozens of misconduct complaints from OPC member has joined Continued From Page 9 women. Vice president Andrew Creighton the national desk at The New York Times. has been on leave while the board looks into Murphy, who served as a head judge in this reportage that exposed the brutal killing a $135,000 settlement involving a former year’s OPC awards, will serve as deputy campaign behind Philippines President employee’s sexual harassment allegations. national enterprise editor at the Times. She ’s war on drugs. The same Its chief digital officer, Mike Germano, was previously worked as a senior editor at the reporting garnered the Reuters team this sacked in January following sexual harass- Los Angeles Times, as assistant managing year’s inaugural Roy Rowan Award for best ment allegations against him. Dubuc is editor, foreign and national news, oversee- investigative work on an international story. slated to leave A&E on April 16. ing all the paper’s foreign coverage. Mur- Reuters also won the Pulitzer Prize in Fea- phy won a Pulitzer for international report- ture Photography for images of Rohingya NEW YORK: PBS has named ing in 2005 for her coverage of Russia. refugees fleeing Myanmar. as sole anchor of its nightly . The announcement comes UPDATES The New York Times has announced that nearly 18 months after her co-anchor, Gwen OPC member David Ariosto has taken OPC Secretary Liam Stack will serve Ifill, died. Woodruff has anchored the show the helm as managing editor of the France- as part of the new politics reporting team since 2011, joining forces with Ifill as co- based digital media outlet Brut. Ariosto de- for 2018. A Times release about the move anchor and managing editors in 2013. She scribes Brut as a “social-only international described Stack as “an imaginative reporter previously worked as anchor for NBC and news company, akin to AJ+ or NowThis.” It who covers social and political issues on CNN. currently has about 350 million viewers per Express and spent years covering the and the .” He is among a month. In an article for Medium, the outlet OPC member and Foundation board mem- credited its popularity to the use of engage- total of 13 and three editors named ber Nick Schifrin is joining the expanding as part of this year’s politics team. Stack ment metrics to zero in on what its readers PBS NewsHour team as full-time foreign af- respond to most. joined the Times as a Cairo-based reporter fairs and defense correspondent this spring. in 2011. For the last two years, he has been a PBS The Reuters news operation has received NewsHour special correspondent, creat- a $10 billion shot in the arm in the wake OPC Treasurer Abigail Pesta has an- ing weeklong series from Russia, Eastern of Blackstone’s takeover of the Thompson nounced in April that she is writing a book Europe, Kenya, Nigeria, and other coun- Reuters financial terminal business. Part of about the young gymnasts who teamed up to tries. Since last summer, he has reported the deal requires Blackstone to pay Reuters take down serial predator Larry Nassar, the on foreign affairs from Washington, D.C., News $325 million a year for 30 years. The Olympic doctor who got away with sexually with a focus on Russia, North Korea and the company’s lucrative terminal business has abusing hundreds of girls over decades. The Middle East. Prior to working at NewsHour, long been a financial stabilizer the Reuters Team is slated for publication by Hachette Schifrin was Al Jazeera America’s Middle News operation, which employs about (Seal Press) in 2019. Pesta covered the East correspondent, based in . Be- 3,000 journalists in 200 locations around story for Cosmopolitan. She told Publishers fore that, he was a correspondent for ABC the world. But the deal raises questions Weekly that she had been one of the first News. He was the network’s Afghanistan- about what will happen once the terminal journalists to write about the subject for a Pakistan correspondent from 2008 to 2012. business comes under Blackstone leader- national publication. In 2011, he was one of the first journalists to ship. Thomson Reuters board members arrive in Abbottabad, Pakistan after Osama At an Online News Association gathering were divided about the deal, with chairman bin Laden’s death and delivered one of the on May 11, OPC member and former Gov- David Thompson pushing for a higher price. year’s biggest exclusives: the first video ernor Daniel Sieberg delivered the clos- Felix Salmon of Recode wrote that Reuters from inside bin Laden’s compound. Amna ing keynote on business models based on News should use the money to “embark on Nawaz, formerly a reporter for NBC and blockchain technology as a road to sustain- a reinvention which will allow it to maintain a digital anchor for ABC, will also join able journalism. Blockchain powers cryp- its size and scope when the money runs out PBS NewsHour as correspondent and fill-in tocurrencies like Bitcoin, and also systems in 2048.” anchor. like Ethereum for monetizing news content. A&E Networks president and CEO Nancy Sieberg is co-founder of a platform called OPC Governor is Dubuc will step down to take a post as Civil that uses blockchain technology. slated to host a New York Times miniseries Vice Media’s next CEO. Dubuc will replace podcast focused on the rise of the Islamic OPC members Mort Rosenblum, Alexis Vice co-founder Shane Smith, who is tak- State, the fall of Mosul and the ongoing ef- Okeowo and Jon Sawyer participated in ing a new position as Executive Chairman forts to fight the organization. “Caliphate” a day-long symposium on peace, conflict to focus on strategic deals and content de- will follow the format of Serial and S-Town, and the media in New York on April 11. The velopment. Dubuc said in a statement that with a limited run of episodes. The podcast organization War Stories Peace Stories host- “anyone who knows me well knows I am an was announced at the SXSW Interactive ed the program, which included panels on a entrepreneur, creator, rebel and disruptor at Conference in Austin, Texas on March 10. range of topics. Rosenblum, a reporter and heart.” Dubuc takes the helm at a time when The Times plans to experiment with giving professor at the University of Arizona, Tuc- Vice is under fire following a spate of sex- subscribers early access to episodes. This son, moderated a panel on how reporting ual harassment scandals, with a New York marks the Times’ first foray into narrative frames our understanding of violent conflict. Times investigation in December turning documentary storytelling. Okeowo recently released her debut book, April-May 2018 10 11 A Moonless, Starless Sky: Ordinary Women by Andrea Bernstein. She also talked about and sexual harassment to the future of the and Men Fighting Extremism In Africa. She the project on Democracy Now with Amy women’s movement. Also speaking on the discussed the book with Robert J. Rosen- Goodman. panel was Emily Steel, business reporter thal, a journalist and executive producer at the New York Times who won the OPC at The Center for Investigative Reporting. OPC Governor Lara Setrakian spoke Foundation’s David R. Schweisberg Memo- Sawyer, who works for the Pulitzer Center, at the formal launch of a new initiative rial Scholarship in 2005, and co-wrote the joined four other panelists to discuss how devoted to changing newsroom culture sur- New York Times story that led to the ouster their organizations are re-thinking conflict rounding sexual harassment on March 13. of longtime Fox News host Bill O’Reilly, reporting and seeking new ways to cover Setrakian is co-founder of Press Forward, and , CNN anchor and cre- crises. which announced its advisory board at the ator of CNN’s American Woman series. event. She is one of the women who ac- OPC member Cassandra Vinograd was cused political journalist Mark Halperin of OPC member Ceylan Yeginsu wrote a one of three winners of the “Pitching for sexual harassment. Setrakian called the or- story for The New York Times in May cover- Peace” grant competition, for her project on ganization a network for women who have ing a firestorm sparked by a single tweet grassroots peacemakers in Africa’s Great endured “creepy and abusive behavior” in from the country’s national account: Swed- Lakes region. She and the other winners the news industry. The board includes Jake ish meatballs originally came from . were invited to present their projects at Tapper and of CNN, Judy “Swedish meatballs are actually based on a April’s “War Stories, Peace Stories Sympo- Woodruff of PBS and former ABC News recipe King Charles XII brought home from sium.” Vinograd also was a panelist at the anchor Ted Koppel. Setrakian is the chief Turkey in the early 18th century,” the tweet International Journalism Festival in Perugia, executive officer, co-founder and executive said. “Let’s stick to the facts!” The confes- discussing gender and foreign correspon- editor of the digital media company News sion caused some sparring between Turks dents. Deeply. and Swedes over social media. Yeginsu asked what this revelation might mean for Separately, Mort Rosenblum was induct- John Moore, OPC member and multiple Ikea, which serves two million meatballs ed into the Hall of Fame at the University of winner of OPC photography awards, was daily around the world. Arizona’s journalism school for his work as work featured in a New York Times piece a foreign correspondent, author and teacher The retrospective on March 25. The piece, PRINCETON, NJ: OPC Governor that “exemplifies the highest of professional titled “Where Fear and Hope Collide: Im- Christopher Dickey spoke at Salon on achievements in journalism.” He embarked ages From Mexican Border, and Beyond,” Stockton: A Little Literary Festival in Princ- on his first assignment as a foreign corre- looked back at a decade of his coverage of eton on April 13. The Paris-based foreign spondent for the Associated Press in 1967, the Mexican border and included 17 photo- editor for Beast will talk about and over a career spanning 40 years covered graphs that illuminated many angles of the his book, Our Man in Charleston: Britain’s 200 countries, including stints as bureau issue. Azam Ahmed, the Times bureau chief Secret Agent in the Civil War South, which chief in the Congo, Nigeria, Kuala Lumpur, for Mexico, Central America and the Carib- follows the story of UK diplomat and spy Singapore, Buenos Aires and Paris. bean, wrote that Moore captures “intimate Robert Bunch, who lived a double life dur- portraits of both migrants and border offi- ing the run up to the America Civil War, and OPC Governor Anjali Kamat has re- cers who square off on either side,” and that warned the UK against supporting the Con- ceived coverage and plaudits for her year- his images provide depth and context. “For federacy on fears it would lead to a massive long investigation into President Trump’s Mr. Moore, immigration begins and ends increase in slaves Africa. business deals in India. Her story, titled well beyond the physical border — a line “Political Corruption and the Art of the where fear and hope collide to shape Ameri- SYRIA: OPC Governor Rod Nordland Deal,” was published as a cover story in the can politics.” Moore won the OPC John wrote a dispatch about his travels to Ain- New Republic and aired in two parts on the Faber Award in 1997 for images of refugees issa in remote northern Syria in February podcast “Trump, Inc.,” a coproduction of from Zaire for The Associated Press, and to report on the war for The New York WNYC and ProPublica. Her reporting was won the 2007 Robert Capa Award for im- Times. He discussed challenges familiar to supported by The Investigative Fund. The ages of the assassination of then-Pakistani many foreign correspondents -- navigating report delved into five active projects that Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto. bureaucracies and sheaves of paperwork the Trump organization has in India that are under the Syrian Democratic Forces. “As worth an estimated $1.5 billion. She found OPC Governor Azmat Khan spoke on anyone who has worked in Syria knows, that the organization’s India partners faced a panel hosted by ELLE.com with female paperwork is an obsession here,” Nordland a long list of lawsuits, police inquiries and journalists working to champion women’s wrote, adding that the obsession was appar- government investigations, with evidence rights. Khan, an investigative reporter with ently inherited from the time when Bashir of fraud, intimidation, money laundering, New America, talked about a bygone era al-Assad’s regime still ruled the region. tax evasion and illegal land acquisition. when unions demanded that companies Nordland wrote several pieces on the war The report also outlined a list of conflicts make salary databases available, which she in Syria and conflict with Turkey and ISIS of interest, including Jr.’s once used to negotiate pay that was on par from Kurdish-controlled areas. He is inter- repeated trips India to promote real estate with a male colleague. “With a decline in national correspondent at large and Kabul projects during his father’s presidency and unions, this history of salary transparency bureau chief at the Times. offer access to the president’s son. Terry has really gone down the drain,” she said. Gross interviewed Kamat on NPR’s Fresh The conversation covered a range of profes- BEIJING: Author and OPC member Air along with the podcast cohost co-hosted sional topics, from the #metoo movement Continued on Page 8 April-May 2018 11 11 PEOPLE

Continued From Page 11 combatting colonialism and sensationalism as executive producer of “Bill Moyers in photojournalism. Satam, a documentary Journal,” and then as president and execu- Lenora Chu spoke at events during the photographer and student at the Univer- tive producer of Moyers’ production com- 2018 Bookworm Literary Festival in Bei- sity of Missouri, wrote about a Kashmiri pany, Public Affairs Television. Konner jing in early March. Chu served on a panel documentarian’s frustration with foreign was the first woman to helm Columbia’s about gender issues in China and the im- correspondents who parachute into con- journalism graduate school when she be- pact of global movements such as #metoo flict zones to capture dramatic scenes of came dean in 1988. She stepped down in and calls for pay equality. At a separate war without deeper cultural and historical 1997, and continued as publisher of the event she discussed her book, Little Sol- perspective. She also write about a contro- Columbia Journalism Review until 2000. diers, which investigates China’s state-run versy last year surrounding award-winning Longtime OPC member Yvonne Dunleavy school system, institutionalized bribery, photographer Souvid Datta, who garnered recalled that Konner and her husband, Al a deep urban-rural divide and its roots in a prestigious College Photographer of the Perlmutter - and “their adored dog Bliss” ancient Confucianism and Communist Year award but later admitted to plagiarism - had been summer tenants of theirs on dogma. Harper Collins published the book and manipulating images. Satam wondered multiple occasions. in September last year. The Bookworm if Datta “consciously manipulate[d] his Literary Festival included panels, talks and stories so that they would conform to a Following news of the death of Anna events from March 8 to March 25. Eurocentric perspective to gain validation Chennault, a war correspondent and in the Western world?” She calls for dis- Chinese-born Republican fund-raiser and KABUL: OPC member and freelance pho- cussions about ethics in photojournalism anti-Communist lobbyist, longtime OPC tojournalist Jim Huylebroek had several to focus more on problematic issues of member Jonathan Kapstein remem- photographs taken in Kabul featured in a representation. bered that Chennault was often seen at the New York Times piece on March 19. The OPC when the club was at the brownstone photos accompanied a piece titled “The PEOPLE REMEMBERED on Bryant Park South. Chennault died on Story of an Afghan Baby Named Don- Former Washington Post reporter and au- March 30 at her home at the Watergate ald Trump” by Mujib Mashal and Fahim thor William Prochnau died on March complex in Washington, DC at age 94. She Abed, which profiles a rural Afghan family 28 at the age of 80. Prochnau was a con- was a high-profile presence in Washington who named their son after then-candidate tributing editor for Vanity Fair, where his circles and served as an unofficial diplo- Trump in admiration for the tycoon and in article “Adventures in the Ransom Trade” mat under the presidency Ronald Reagan. hopes it would bring fortune to their son. became the basis of the movie Proof of Her husband, Claire L. Chennault, was But the family was kicked out of their vil- Life in 2000. Prochnau had stated that he the leader of the Flying Tigers in China lage and had to move to Kabul because of was most proud of his reporting from Viet- during World War II. Her memoir photos their choice to use a non-Muslim name. nam for The Seattle Times in the mid-60s. show Chennault posing alongside Presi- In the 1980’s, Prochnau left reporting to dents John F. Kennedy, Richard M. Nixon WASHINTON, DC: Orb Media, a non- focus on working as a full-time author. His and Gerald R. Ford; as well as J. Edgar profit journalism organization based in last article for Vanity Fair took 15 years Hoover, and General William C. Westmo- Washington, D.C. that is helmed by OPC to write and was published in this year’s reland. Kapstein remembered that Chen- Governor Molly Bingham, released a February issue. In addition to his wife, Ms. nault was a “good conversationalist but an multimedia report in mid-March about mi- Parker, he is survived by his wife, Laura impatient one. Always on the lookout for a cro plastic particles found in global bottled Parker, a staff writer for National Geo- political opening.” v water brands. The project, titled “Plus graphic magazine, as well as two daughters Plastic,” showed that a single bottle can from his first marriage, Monica Bradley hold dozens or possibly even thousands of and Jennifer McMaster; his brother John; microscopic plastic particles. Tests of more three grandchildren and one great-grand- than 250 bottles from 11 brands reveled a daughter. A daughter from his first mar- global average of more than 10 particles riage, Anna, died in 2015. per liter that could be confirmed as plastic, and more than 300 smaller particles that Joan Konner, former dean of Columbia researchers said was “likely plastic.” The Journalism School and award-winning online project includes text, audio and data broadcaster, passed away on April 18 in visualization components. The Orb Media at the age of 87 after a long Network is slated to publish five more battle with leukemia. Konner graduated projects this year. from Columbia’s journalism school in 1961, later producing documentaries at OPC member Neeta Satam wrote a NBC ten becoming executive producer for provocative piece for the online publish- New York’s public broadcasting station ing platform Medium on the challenges of WNET/Thirteen, where she also served April-May 2018 12 13 PRESS FREEDOM UPDATE... By Farwa Zaidi The Committee to Protect Journal- and Kyaw Soe Oo are accused least ten officers raided the office on April ists, Reporters Without Borders, the of possessing secret government papers. 3, and held journalists for five hours. Police ACOS Alliance and Press Freedom They will be charged under the Official Se- also arrested the website’s editor in chief, Tracker are documenting challenges that crets Act, which carries a maximum penalty Adel Sabri, on claims that Masr al-Arabia journalists face entering or exiting the of 14 years in prison. The journalists had lacks necessary licensing. Po-lice issued . So far, the groups have re- been working on Reuters’ investigation into a 50,000 fine after the site translated and corded at least 19 cases of journalists being the killing of ten Rohingya Muslim men in published a New York Times report alleging stopped at the border since 2008. On April Myanmar’s Rakhine state. On March 28, the election violations. The regulator labeled 2, the OPC put out a call for its members to journalists’ lawyers asked the court to dis- the report as “fake news.” report any cases where a journalist’s device miss the case due to lack of evidence. was searched at the US border, or if they had MURDERS been stopped for extra screening. Journal- A high-profile Mozambican journalist, Eri- A Filipino radio reporter died on May 2 of in- ists experiencing such issues should contact cino de Salema, was abducted on March juries sustained in a shooting attack on April Alex Ellerbeck at CPJ ([email protected]) 28 outside the headquarters of the National 30 in Dumaguete City in the country’s cen- or Margaux Ewen at RSF ([email protected]) Union of Journalists. Salema was beaten tral region. An unidentified gunman shot Ed- to report incidents or seek advice. Reports with AK-47 rifles and sustained fractures to mund Sestoso, reporter for Dumaguete’s can remain anonymous. his arms and legs. According to his wife, Sa- DYGB-FM radio station, several times at lema received an anonymous call on March while he was returning home on a pedicab. A coalition of press freedom groups includ- 26, saying that he “would be silenced for be- The gunman reportedly also shot out the tires ing C PJ , RSF, IFEX, Index on Censor- ing so outspoken.” On a March 25 broadcast, of a pedicab that was preparing to take Ses- ship, and the International Press In- Salema criticized the government’s spending toso to a local hospital. Police are consider- stitute released a report indicating threats and called for Finance Minister Adriano Ma- ing the possibility that Sestoso’s murder was to media in the U.S. increased during the leiane to resign. related to his work as a journalist. Obama administration with a record number of whistleblower attacks, a trend that has A Syrian photographer died from injuries A Pakistani newspaper reporter was shot sharply worsened under President Trump from a landmine explosion on March 19 in and killed by a local politician on March with an uptick in attacks, arrests, border the city of Afrin. Kamel abu al-Walid 27. Pakistani police say Zeeshan Ashraf stops, searches of devices, prosecution of was a photographer for the Turkish backed Butt, a reporter for the Urdu-language news- whistleblowers and restrictions on the re- pro-opposition Jarabulus Media Office. He paper Nawa-i-Waqt, was interviewing Im- lease of public information. The U.S. fell was covering the takeover of Afrin by Turk- ran Cheema in the town of Begowala when two places on the RSF World Press Free- ish forces and Turkish-backed Free Syrian Cheema, head of the local municipal council, dom Index. since last year. The report was Army factions when a landmine planted in shot the journalist. released on World Press Freedom Day on the office building next to him exploded. Al- May 3. Walid had worked as a photographer for the Indian journalist Sandeep Sharma died Jarabulus Media Center since 2016, when after he was struck by a truck while riding on On April 30, at least 10 journalists were the center was first established. He primarily his motorcycle on March 26. Sharma was a killed in a single day in multiple attacks in covered humanitarian efforts in Syria. Prior reporter for the local News World television Afghanistan, one of the deadliest days on re- to his photojournalism work, he was a mem- channel in the state’s Bhind district. Sharma cord for the country’s press. 25 people died ber of the Free Syrian Army. Syria is cur- received death threats last year after publish- in a double suicide bomb attack carried out rently one of the world’s deadliest countries ing two stories in July and October on al- in Kabul by Islamic State. A BBC Pashto for journalists. At least 117 journalists have leged police corruption and illegal sand min- journalist was shot and killed in a separate been killed there in connection to their work ing. Bhind police superintendent Prashant attack in Khost province near the border since the conflict started in 2011. Khare said that the truck driver who hit him with Pakistan. has been arrested, and the incident is under Journalists in Brazil were attacked and investigation. Privately owned Liberian newspaper Front verbally abused on April 7, when they tried Page Africa is facing a $1.8 million civil to cover President Luiz Inacio Lula de Sil- Mexican journalist Leobardo Vasquez defamation lawsuit. The newspaper has long va’s last minutes of freedom before he was Atzin was shot and killed on March 21 been subject to complaints and harassment sent to prison. At least eight journalists were by unknown gunmen in the restaurant he for its’ critical reporting on the government. attacked by demonstrators who had gath- owned in the town of Gutierrez Zamora. A This lawsuit relates to an advertisement ered to support the president before he sur- veteran reporter, Atzin began writing about about land administration published by the rendered himself to authorities. Reporters regional crime, corruption, and general news paper in March. On April 9, police detained with three radio stations, CBN, Bandnews on a Facebook page in February. Several at least seven journalists, and shut down the FM, and Jovem Pan, and three TV channels, posts were critical of Juan Angel Espejo, the office. Bandnews, Rede TV, and Globo, suffered mayor of Tecolutla, the town neighboring verbal and physical violence. Gutierrez Zamora. On March 9, Atzin posted Prominent human rights lawyer Amal that he had received threats and bribe offers Clooney has joined the legal team defend- Police in Egypt raided the offices of inde- to stop writing about the mayor. v ing two Reuters reporters jailed in Myanmar. pendent news website Masr al-Arabia. At April-May 2018 13 13 ‘PEN America’ Continued From Page 8 state power or that’s defamatory, using NEW BOOKS By Farwa Zaidi broad definitions that allow the govern- ment to jail those accused of dissent. Olesen covered China for eight RUSSIA years as a correspondent for The As- sociated Press and has spent more than n ’s Russia, some of the PC member Ian Williams, a longtime a decade living in Beijing, on and off, darkest chapters of the country’s Soviet past United Nations watcher and correspondent since 1993. are giving way to nostalgia, if not fading from Osince 1989, has released his latest effort to I explain and demystify the 70-year-old organiza- Clay Shirky, faculty in Interactive memory altogether. In Masha Gessen’s new book, Media Arts at NYU Shanghai, said Never Remember: Searching for Stalin’s Gulags tion. UNtold: The Real Story of the United Nations many of his students have grown up in Putin’s Russia [Columbia Global Reports, in Peace and War [Just World Books, November during a time when China was opening March 2018], the Russian-American journalist and 2017] chronicles the UN’s history and delves into up to them, and in their college years award-winning Putin biographer finds that Stalin’s its perplexing workings with a spoonful of irrever- they are now seeing that freedom clos- infamous and deadly network of labor camps, the ence. This tone is bolstered every few pages by ing back down. Gulags, are fast fading from history. Gessen and cartoons from “Krishna,” the pen name of a Cana- “It’s difficult to convey the shock,” photographer Misha Friedman traveled across dian citizen and a former award-winning illustrator among students and colleagues, he said. Russia to trace the legacy of these camps and the for “Sesame Street,” who has a day job at the UN. His cartoons have appeared in and “The ring of censorship which had orig- memory of those who were killed. other publications. inally conceived of as this great firewall Gessen and Friedman visited the sites of three Williams challenges several widespread had shrunk down to people sensing that former Gulag camps. They went to Sandarmokh, notions about the UN, including a myth that it is there’s a wall around them.” Shirky north of St. Petersburg, where thousands of victims meant to serve as a global government. He explains is the author of two books on social of Stalin’s Great Terror were executed in 1937 and that it is instead “bossed around by 193 national 1938. The two met with children of victims who media: Here Comes Everybody and governments,” which foist intractable problems on have spent a lifetime piecing together details of Cognitive Surplus. the international body and often force it to serve their parents’ deaths. They discover that records Edward Wong, an international cor- as a scapegoat. While isolationists and nationalists respondent for The New York Times and and history of these atrocities have been all but accuse the organization of corruption and waste, a Nieman Fellow at Harvard University, erased. Williams argues, most of the “peoples of the said it’s a mistake to say that the current Their next stop was a site known as Gulag world” support the idea of an organization that crackdown is solely Xi’s initiative, Perm-36, 900 miles east of Moscow near the Ural can send peacekeepers because his predecessor, Hu Jintao, had Mountains, where a forced-labor logging camp to end a war and to already started to intensify restrictions. had been converted into a museum dedicated to coordinate international Large-scale unrest in Tibet in 2008 victims of political oppression. They speak with response to diseases and and Urumchi in 2009 caused Beijing a former inmate, Sergey Kovalev, a survivor and disasters – natural or to clamp down on digital tools for human rights activist who describes harrowing man-made. organizing political action. “The party memories of life in the prison. The museum was The book catalogs has a very existential fear of these taken over by local officials in 2015 and its focus and describes in plain regions breaking off,” he said. “There’s changed from atrocities to the camp’s contribution language many of the a misconception that it’s a police state, as a timber supplier and its role in securing victory UN’s lesser-known and that there’s not even kindling for in World War II. The journalists’ last stop was institutions, such protests, but there is a statistic that Butugychag in remote Siberia, the site of a former as the World Court, Chinese researcher [Sun Liping] came tin and uranium mine and one of the biggest and Trusteeship Council up with that there were 180,000 acts of deadliest Gulag camps. and the Economic and social protest in China in 2010.” Gessen suggests that despite heroic efforts of a Social Council (which he calls the “Cinderella of Wong was an Iraq correspondent for few people who have attempted to retain memory the UN”). He also includes some of its quirks and the Times from 2003 to 2007 and cov- of the Gulags, the tide of revision and denial seems customs, such as the reason behind the General ered China from Beijing for the Times poised to bury that history forever. Requests to Assembly’s meeting time in September, which for nearly a decade afterwards. Wong memorialize Butugychag have been denied by the was set in 1945 when leaders from Europe wanted won the OPC Foundation’s David state. to ensure they had enough time to travel back by Schweisberg scholarship in 1998. v Masha Gessen’s book The Future is History: steamship before Christmas. How Totalitarianism Reclaimed Russia won the Williams, who has been an OPC member for 2017 National Book Award. She also many years, currently lectures at Bard’s Center for won the OPC’s 2016 Best Commen- Globalization and International Affairs on the UN tary Award for essays on “Trump, and the Responsibility to Protect. He has covered Russia and the Reality of Power” for the UN since 1989 for The Guardian, among other the New York Review of Books. She has publications. Williams has personally known four Secretaries General and numerous diplomats and received the Guggenheim Fellowship officials around the world.v and Carnegie Fellowship and is a staff writer at The New Yorker. Misha Fried- man is an award-winning photographer whose work is regularly featured in The New Yorker, TIME, Der Spiegel, Le Monde and The New York Times. v April-May 2018 14 Louise Boyle COURTESY OF LOUISE BOYLE LOUISE OF COURTESY Meet the OPC Members: Q&A With Louise Boyle by chad bouchard Major challenge as a journalist: Stories I’m most proud of: Sometimes people have trouble with my Most recently, my articles on White ouise boyle earned her MA accent on the phone! House aide Rob Porter and the accusa- (Hons) in English Literature from tions of domestic abuse made by his two LEdinburgh University in 2007, Best journalism advice received: ex-wives. They were impactful and I’m where she was also an editor on the Talk to everyone – you never know who always proud to report the stories of those university’s newspaper. She started out can tell you key information or might who have suffered abuse. as a trainee for the Daily Mail in London have a valuable story to share. On a before spending time at The Belfast practical level, wear comfortable shoes – Dream job: To be part of an investiga- Telegraph and then the Irish Daily Mail you’ll be glad of it on days which stretch tive team, like Megan Twohey and Jodi in Dublin where she was an editor in the into 15 hours. Kantor at The New York Times, working features department. Boyle moved to on ground-breaking exposés. New York in 2011, soon after Worst experience as a journalist: DailyMail.com established its U.S. base. Anytime I speak to a family who have Favorite quote: “Never trust a man who, She has traveled to more than 40 U.S. lost loved ones – it’s part of the job that I when left alone in a room with a tea cozy, states to cover stories and reported from have found never gets any easier. doesn’t try it on.” – Billy Connolly several countries around the world. When traveling, you like to … Place you’re most eager to visit: Japan. Hometown: Gourock, Scotland. Talk with local people about the area. When you’re reporting on demanding sto- Most over-the-top assignment: Education: MA (Honors) in English ries, it’s easy to become totally immersed I took an assignment to write a honey- Literature, Edinburgh University. but I like to learn about different cultures moon travel feature for a bridal magazine. (and I also like to talk!). I stayed in a five-star resort in beautiful Languages you speak: English, French Dubrovnik. One evening, we were taken (and currently taking Spanish classes). Hardest story: Interviewing survivors of by speedboat to a private island for din- the Pulse nightclub shooting in Orlando, ner. This is far from my typical travel First job in journalism: Copy editor for many of whom had also lost partners or experience! the Belfast Telegraph. close friends. I’ve also interviewed survi- vors of rape and sexual violence – I have Most common mistake you’ve seen: Countries reported from: UK, Ireland, enormous admiration for those who have Following the pack. U.S., , Honduras, Philippines, the the bravery to tell their stories. Caribbean. Country you most want to return to: Journalism heroes: Christina Lamb, Mexico. v When and why did you join the OPC? Robert Fisk and AA Gill. I joined OPC at the start of 2018 because of the quality of the talks and events and Advice for journalists who want to the opportunities to network with fellow work overseas: There are no shortcuts – Want to add to the OPC’s collection of journalists. work hard, say yes to opportunities when Q&As with members? Please contact they arise and be straight with people, no [email protected]. matter the situation.

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David Furst Roxana Saberi PAST PRESIDENTS International Picture Editor Foreign Correspondent EX-OFFICIO The New York Times CBS News Marcus Mabry Charles Graeber Lara Setrakian Michael Serrill Freelance Journalist Co-Founder & CEO David A. Andelman and Author News Deeply John Corporon Douglas Jehl Vivienne Walt Allan Dodds Frank Foreign Editor Correspondent The Washington Post Alexis Gelber BOARD OF GOVERNORS TIME and FORTUNE William J. Holstein Anjali Kamat Marshall Loeb Freelance Journalist ASSOCIATE BOARD PRESIDENT ACTIVE BOARD Larry Martz Azmat Khan MEMBERS­ Deidre Depke David Ariosto Brian Byrd Managing Editor Investigative Reporter Larry Smith Managing Editor Program Officer Brut New America Richard B. Stolley Marketplace NYS Health Foundation FIRST VICE PRESIDENT Molly Bingham Scott Kraft President & CEO Deputy Managing Editor Bill Collins EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR Deborah Amos Communications Consultant Patricia Kranz Correspondent OrbMedia, Inc. Los Angeles Times Ford Motor Company NPR Rukmini Callimachi Rachael Morehouse OFFICE MANAGER Foreign Correspondent Associate Producer Emma Daly SECOND VICE Farwa Zaidi PRESIDENT The New York Times CBS News 60 Minutes Communications Director Human Rights Watch Calvin Sims Christopher Dickey Rod Nordland EDITOR President and CEO Foreign Editor International Correspondent Sarah Lubman Chad Bouchard International House , Paris at Large Partner THIRD VICE PRESIDENT Paula Dwyer Kabul Bureau Chief Brunswick Group OPC BULLETIN The New York Times Pancho Bernasconi Editor Minky Worden ISSN-0738-7202 ­ Bloomberg News Vice President, Global News Mary Rajkumar Director of Global Copyright © 2015 QuickTakes Getty Images International Enterprise Editor Initiatives Over­seas Press Club The Associated Press TREASURER Linda Fasulo Human Rights Watch of America Abigail Pesta Independent Reporter Freelance Journalist United Nations NPR SECRETARY Liam Stack Josh Fine Senior Segment Producer Reporter HBO’s Real Sports The New York Times with Bryant Gumbel 40 West 45 Street, New York, NY 10036, USA • 212.626.9220 • 212.626.9210 • 16 Phone Fax opcofamerica.org April-May 2018