All Blog Posts from Public Eye

While the nation’s attention is occupied with the Mark Foley scandal and the upcoming midterm elections, let’s not forget there are other things happening in the world. Yes, the war in Iraq gets scant attention these days but at least the subject is danced around from time to time, unlike horrifying violence elsewhere. Still, it’s worth noting a warning that is being sounded by one journalist about a situation that may be getting worse in Darfur. Journalist Paul Salopek who spent over a month in captivity after being accused by Sudanese authorities of attempting to enter the Darfur region without a visa, provides an account of his experience in the Chicago Tribune. Salopek believes his capture was a messsage to journalists everywhere:

The government in Khartoum charged us with espionage, spreading "false news" and entering Africa's latest killing field without a visa.

It was hard not to feel, however, that our real crime was unspoken: reporting on a humanitarian catastrophe that is largely invisible to the outside world, and that is poised to grow worse in the weeks ahead.

Will anyone notice?

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The brief imprisonment of Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Paul Salopek and his release last week made for a feel-good story about brave journalists taking ultimate risks to bring the world a story. But Newsweek’s Tony Dokoupil has a stunning reminder of why those risks are so important to take. Dokoupil brings us the result of a new study estimating the human toll the violence in Darfur has caused (hat tip: Eat The Press):

Sociologist John Hagan completed his book “Justice in the Balkans,” a critical look at the Hague Tribunal and war crimes in the former Yugoslavia, just as violence erupted in Sudan’s western province of Darfur in 2003. Now more than three years later, the Northwestern University professor has turned to correcting historical errors in real time. His study, coauthored with University of Wisconsin professor Alberto Palloni and to be published tomorrow in the journal Science, provides the first rigorous estimate of the death toll in Darfur. The two scientists found that 200,000 to 400,000 people have died since violence began, rather than the tens of thousands widely reported in the media.

Dokoupil has an interview with Hagan worth reading and serves as a reminder that this story is important to tell, regardless of the risks.

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Given the sudden amount of media attention directed at Darfur – due in some large part to George Clooney's star-powered push to distribute news about the long war-torn region, including an appearance at a protest yesterday on the National Mall – we decided it was as good a time as any to reprise a story from a few months ago that seems appropriate.

Back in October, I took a look at the overall amount of coverage that the African region gets among the major networks, which was, somewhat predictably, quite small. Andrew Tyndall reported at the time that from January through September of last year, sub-Saharan Africa received a total of 67 minutes of coverage on the evening newscasts, which represents 2% of overall foreign coverage among all three programs. And the catalyst for in depth coverage is typically the result of a celebrity-driven campaign or a visit by a major U.S. official:

Looking at network news in general, much of the coverage of the region and its conflicts is often prompted only when a major U.S. administration official visits the region or, more often, when a celebrity calls attention to it. For example, all three networks covered Condoleezza Rice’s July trip to the Sudan, although much of the content focused on a fracas in which reporters were roughed up by Sudanese officials. Don Cheadle’s film, “Hotel Rwanda,” which dealt with the genocide in that country, called attention to conflicts in the region on all three networks for several weeks. ABC’s “Good Morning America” anchor Diane Sawyer’s interview with Brad Pitt in Africa, the content of which focused primarily on Pitt’s concerns about poverty there, was the subject of a “Primetime Live” full hour and two days of coverage on “Good Morning America.”

You can check out the full post here.

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