The Walkley Magazine - Foreign Correspondence

A month of bodies and bombs

For the past four years, CNN’s Mic hael Holmes has been reportin g the tragedy of Iraq. It’s a horrifying story, but one he feels compelled to tell in all its gruesome detail. Artwork by Karl Hilzinger.

Arriving in Baghdad in many ways feels like returning to a second home.
I’m not sure that’s a healthy sentiment – Baghdad has for the past four years been a place few want to call home, and most want to leave.
On this occasion, my bosses wanted us to film “behind the scenes” footage to show people how we work, and give more time to showing the realities on the ground in Iraq. I cringed a little when told the documentary would be called Month of Mayhem.
It proved to be a more than apt title.

This was my eighth visit, my first being as the war wound down in 2003.
I was driving from Kuwait and into Baghdad with the Marines of the 1st MEF.
During the seven earlier “tours” I had witnessed a steady deterioration in the level of security and services; despite my hopes, it has always been worse.
And I knew this trip would be no different.

It really becomes a matter of how bad it’s going to be. Before leaving the airport – before leaving home, for that matter – I know there will be bodies and bombs. It’s only a question of who and how many. And, yes, there are prayers that you don’t make the daily list of victims. But still I return, as do many colleagues. Well, not so many these days.

Shaky Isles get the quality jitters

Moves to cut staff and outsource production are causing upheaval in New Zealand. Is it the end of quality journalism or just another change with which to contend, asks Martin Hirst. Illustration by Rod Emmerson.

It’s probably not a good time to be an expat Aussie journalist trying to establisha career in the New Zealand media, but that’s what former senior Nine Network reporter and editor Anthony Flannery is trying to do.
Flannery has taken over as head of news and current affairs at TVNZ, the state-owned hybrid New Zealand broadcaster, at a time when the network is in financial trouble and shedding staff at a rate of knots. It’s also attempting to launch a new 24-hour news channel and bed down its on-demand television-over-the-web service. And if that’s not enough to give Flannery a headache, TVNZ is also involved with a consortium that’s just established a new satellite delivery service for free-to-air programming in a market dominated by Murdoch’s SkyTV.

Why it’s all quiet on the West Papua front

Intimidating journalists is standard procedure when you visit our near neighbour, says Morgan Mellish.

In September, Today Tonight presenter Naomi Robson created headlines when she and her crew were booted out of West Papua
without getting beyond Jayapura. Robson’s attempted journey inside the restive Indonesian province highlighted the difficulties of reporting from this tightly controlled police state.

Within days of the Seven Network crew being ejected, three other Australian journalists travelled inside West Papua and all encountered official interference and intimidation.

On Dangerous Ground

Rochelle Mutt on has reported from Zimbabwe and South Af rican townships, but it was a course on the NSW Central Coast that gave her the skills to cope where previously she had stumbled.

Heart pounding, I open the back car-door to reach a groaning woman – her arm is sliced open and broken bones are sticking out. At first it looks like a horrific car crash. But as my news crew rush in to help the foreign reporters, we realise they’ve been attacked.

She cries in pain as I pressurise the wound with bandaging. I then notice her stomach heaving under her other arm.

Vaguely aware of my crew attending the other three injured women, I lift up her good arm. Mid-way through reeling off calming words, I gag. Her guts are spilling out.

Under The Gun In Dili

David O’Shea was caught in the cross fire when East Timor erupted, but it was the local journalists who Had the worst of it.

"One!”

With his finger on the trigger, rebel leader Alfredo Reinado shouted to the government soldiers approaching just a hundred or so metres away.

He would give them to the count of 10 to retreat or he would fire.

“Two!”

I could hardly believe what I was witnessing.

I had just finished interviewing Reinado on a hill on the eastern outskirts of Dili, the capital of East Timor. Now, sprawled on the ground taking cover behind an abandoned house, he was threatening to shoot at his former colleagues.

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