Feature

WITTEN BY EMMA HEARING

Looking on as a helpless outsider to the Ukrainian crisis has made me realise the importance of war reporting more than ever before. I can speak from personal experience, as I was married to a war correspondent for twenty years. It is due to the courage of some of these brave journalists that wars such as those in Ukraine, can be reported back to the rest of the world with a greater degree of accuracy.

We lived in Nairobi in the mid-'90s, where Roger was the BBC East Africa Correspondent. During that time he escaped kidnap threats, was shot on a balcony in Rwanda (Hotel de Mille Collines which was the inspiration for “Hotel Rwanda”) and had many other narrow escapes. Miraculously, over two decades he came through all the many conflicts unscathed. He had an innate way of smelling out danger, but backing off when it became too risky. Sadly, not all of our friends made it through, including an American colleague Dan Eldon, who was among one of the journalists mobbed and killed by a crowd in Mogadishu when Roger was in Somalia.

We visited Rwanda together soon after the civil war had ended, to cover a story on how far the Rwandan gorillas (as opposed to guerillas) had escaped into the forests and volcanoes of the Virunga mountains. It turned into rather a gruelling trip when we were diverted to cover a story unfolding at a nearby football stadium, where thousands of deceased Rwandans were being reburied into individual graves. I naively followed along, not knowing what to expect. I shall never forget the sights and smells we saw that day.

Some of the journalists and aid workers I knew were mistakenly attracted to the adrenalin of war. They certainly were a colourful bunch; this was no more apparent than with Emma McCune. In spite of her Catholic upbringing, she fell in love with a Warlord, Riek Machar, who took her to live with his tribe in South Sudan. She had her own bodyguard who was with her at all times, but tragically died a few years later. There were rumours that a rival faction leader had been responsible (although not the case). Emma’s story is recounted in a book by her mother, “Emma’s War; Love, Betrayal and Death in the Sudan” by Deborah Scroggins.

Whether it was to go to Afghanistan, Iraq, Lebanon or another war, this involved dropping everything, grabbing a flak jacket, helmet, and in those days a huge satellite phone. Sometimes, “the big cheeses” as they were known, would `gazump’ Roger in the process of going to war. Journalists like John Simpson, George Alagiah, Jeremy Bowen and Lyse Doucet, would call to ask if he could cover their presenting shifts on Radio 4. This, I was at least grateful for when our children were little. Alice used to find it quite amusing to hear him broadcast live, and loved to pronounce “Slobodan Milosevic”; no wonder she ended up being a journalist. I would often turn on the World Service in the middle of the night when they were babies, to hear Roger’s dulcet tones talking to me down the radio waves.

Improving technology has greatly helped today’s war correspondent. No need now to heave around enormous satellite phones (they had to leave one hurriedly on a runway in Mogadishu once). Flak jackets are getting a lot lighter to wear. In Africa in the ‘90s, a live broadcast wasn’t always possible, so they would hash together what was known as a “codded two-way”. The questions and answers were pre- recorded, and Roger was made to wear a fake earpiece to make it look “live”! The images of war have also definitely become more graphic with the advent of new technologies, and the BBC claim today, that they have an obligation to film ‘the desperate reality’ of a conflict.

I disagree with journalists going behind enemy lines, but if they decide to do so for the sake of a story, then who are we to judge if they choose to risk their own lives. Journalists like Marie Colvin who was killed, and the BBC’s Frank Gardener who was shot and badly injured in Saudi, are examples of what can happen when it goes wrong. All of the ones that I know say it is a risk worth taking. I know that I can speak for all of us however, when I say that we pray for a swift ending to the current crisis in Ukraine.