by Francis Mead Motown = Motor City = famous artists = cars = shut-off water supplies = UN = human rights. Huh? Detroit combines all of the above. Two UN human rights reporters – officially they’re called “Special Rapporteurs” - visited the Michigan city recently,...
by Gill Fickling Eight pm on a Friday evening. My skype pings with an incoming message. It’s my cameraman/fixer, Wade Fairley, in the Solomon Islands where I’m due to be joining him the following Monday to shoot two stories for “21st Century”. There’s been a...
by GILL FICKLING When I first met Akhtar in 2009, he was dirty, hungry, disillusioned and scared. He was then living in a squalid camp of flimsy cardboard boxes in Greece’s western port city, Patras, along with 1600 other Afghan boys and men who, like him, had...
by Francis Mead We won't forget Beerato. It's a village in central Somaliland. Dust, sheep, goats, camels - and bold women, insisting on changing their lives - and knowing how to party - dancing, singing and clapping in the Sufi style. Cameraman Antonio Tibaldi and...
by Mary Ferreira and Haris Kakar Recently I had the pleasure of working with and mentoring a young journalist from Afghanistan, Haris Kakar, a participant in the Reham al-Farra Memorial Journalists Fellowship Programme which ran for 5-weeks this year - one week in...
By Mary Ferreira Montevideo, Uruguay - Covering the visit to Uruguay of the UN Special Rapporteur, Pablo de Greiff, led us to several places in Montevideo including the Supreme Court, the President’s office, and the Office of Human Rights. Pablo met with government...
by Mary Ferreira Port-au-Prince, Haiti - The number of children living on the streets of Port-au-Prince alone doubled to 4,000 since the 2010 earthquake says UNICEF. They’re everywhere – darting in between cars – trying to survive in a country mired in poverty....
by Mary Ferreira Port-au-Prince, Haiti - An assignment to produce a story about youth and democracy, supported by the United Nations Democracy Fund (UNDEF), following the 2010 earthquake brought me back to Haiti with cameraman, Joaquim Vieira. I first visited this...
by Mary Ferreira Rosemary Marimo is a woman with purpose. She began prospecting for gold in Musowe, Zimbabwe with her husband 20 years ago. Now, 60 years old, she has been running the business alone. I first met Rosemary when I visited Zimbabwe to produce a feature...
by Mary Ferreira 3 December 2012 - After much flying time, we arrived in Zimbabwe to film a story on Gender Equality and Women’s Empowerment. As part of the story, a workshop sponsored by UNDP, held in the town of Masvingo some 180 miles from Harare, was also...
PRODUCER: GILL FICKLING At the deserted end of a beach east of Cape Town, the waves crashing in front against a backdrop of the city’s most famous landmark, Table Mountain, Oyama Mbopa danced. In her head, she sang the Brenda Fassie song “Memeza”, about a woman’s...
by Francis Mead In the midst of violent conflict, one of the hardest things is to be a parent. At the best of times, in the most peaceful places, teenagers and young people can get into trouble. But in the middle of the Arab-Israeli conflict, getting into trouble...
