Joanne Tomkinson
Joanne Tomkinson joined AlertNet from Oxfam in 2007. She regularly scans the global coverage of emergencies and digests the most interesting highlights for AlertNet's MediaWatch section.
MEDIAWATCH: Bleak forecast for Afghanistan
With new figures showing that civilian deaths are now at their highest levels since U.S.-led forces toppled the Taliban seven years ago, and with corruption and mismanagement hampering the international reconstruction effort, there has been an awful lot of bad news coming out of Afghanistan of late. Even as U.S. President Barak Obama readies to send 17,000 more troops into the country, commentators are predicting a rocky road ahead as the situation in Afghanistan looks set to unravel even further. ...
MEDIAWATCH: U.S. role in Uganda rebel operation under fire
A multinational offensive aimed at wiping out Uganda's Lord's Resistance Army (LRA) rebels seems to have backfired, scattering fighters who've unleashed a wave of brutal massacres on Congolese villages. The Washington Post writes the operation has been so unsuccessful it amounts to little more than "throwing a rock at a hive of bees". LRA fighters have killed nearly 900 people in reprisal attacks in northeast Congo since Ugandan troops, together with Sudanese and Congolese soldiers, launched a military operation against fugitive rebel leader Joseph Kony in December. ...
MEDIAWATCH: Cautious optimism after Nkunda arrest
The capture of a rebel leader does not, of course, a lasting peace agreement make. Yet following the shock arrest of Congolese Tutsi rebel leader Laurent Nkunda in Rwanda last week, some of those watching the region say there are some new reasons to be optimistic - albeit cautiously so - over the future of Congo's protracted and deadly conflict. "This unlikely partnership is a good sign for the war-torn region," says the Boston Globe, referring to the new agreement between former foes Congo and Rwanda which lead to Nkunda's arrest. ...
MEDIAWATCH: Did the Poznan climate talks produce more than a lot of hot air?
The general verdict on this month's U.N. climate change talks in Poland is that they made little concrete progress towards a new international pact to fight global warming. But some media assessments detected notes of optimism amid the gloom. The Chicago Tribune newspaper says the talks demonstrated a growing global consensus on the need for measures to help the world's most vulnerable nations adapt to a changing climate, and on mechanisms to ensure that new emission-cutting technologies are shared with developing countries. ...
MEDIAWATCH: Ending rape during wartime
In eastern Congo there are villages where almost every woman has been raped, where women have been forced to have sex with their sons, where wives have been sexually assaulted in front of their husbands, and where even babies aren't spared, Britain's Guardian newspaper reports in a feature on the horrific scale of attacks against women in the conflict-ravaged country. "Since they raped me nowhere in my body feels right. I have problems with my womb, back and stomach. The rebels took my daughter and now I'm looking after my four grandchildren. I have to sleep in the church because I have no house," Madame, 70, told the paper. ...
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