"He told me to either leave or they would beat me very terribly." Iraq's autonomous Kurdish region has long had a reputation in the West as a bastion of stability in a chaotic region plagued…
"The police broke down the door of my apartment and forced me to undress." When the security software on Moroccan journalist Hicham Mansouri's computer alerted him that there had been a number of attempts to…
"I knew that they have just one goal: they want to see me out of journalism." The calls came to Tajik journalist Humayra Bakhtiyar at her sports club, at the shopping center and at home.…
"You really feel like your country has betrayed you." Sonali Samarasinghe remembers the last words of her husband, Lasantha Wickrematunge, on the day in 2009 when he was killed: “Don’t worry, I got it under…
"One thing is broken: my heart." When Turkish journalist Arzu Yildiz reported a major scoop in 2014, she had little idea that the story might lead to the end of her journalism career, the loss…
"Work is something that brings back confidence." Shiro Oguni had ordered a hamburger, but he wasn't all that surprised when his server brought him a plate of fried dumplings instead. The Japanese television director was…
"Promoters are giving incentives to the person at the radio station to play an album." The problem of payola, the practice of bribing of paying someone to use their influence to promote a particular product…
“I was seeing more than just the images of poverty.” The Kenyan capital Nairobi has boomed in recent years as economic growth has generated high-rise office buildings and teeming traffic jams now dot what was…
"We're sort of aware of that we're in a building that's on fire." When she was eight, Pamela Longobardi nearly drowned in the Atlantic while bodysurfing in New Jersey. A riptide sucked her towards an…
'China's very much in the region to stay' When Chinese President Xi Jinping unveiled what became known as the Belt and Road Initiative in 2013, the massive infrastructure project was quickly dubbed the "New Silk…
