From Our Own Correspondent

The drug-related violence in Mexico is sometimes described as being “like a war.” Certainly the death toll justifies calling it that, with three hundred thousand people killed in the past fifteen years, many of them innocent civilians. About a hundred thousand have simply disappeared, presumed dead, and with their families left to search for them. Will Grant travelled to the northern state of Sonora, and joined locals digging in the ground, both hopeful - and fearful - of what they might find.The long-running civil war in Syria has forced half the country to leave their homes: around six and a half million are internally displaced within Syria, and another six and a half million have fled abroad. Most of those who reached Europe have gone to Germany, many traumatised, having survived bombings, or lost family members in the fighting – some have been tortured. You might expect these people would form tight-knit communities, as victims of similar harsh experiences looking out for each other. However, when Michae

When Novak Djokovic landed in Melbourne, few could have imagined that his impending encounters on the tennis court would be upstaged by a legal battle, one which then prompted a row between his country and Australia. After immigration officials held the Serb player in a hotel, Djokovic’s father said his son was being “crucified”. Then Serbia’s Foreign Ministry claimed that the player had been deliberately lured to Australia in order to humiliate him, as part of a “political game.” Guy Delauney explains that the affair has touched a raw nerve in Serbia, with an importance way beyond the tennis court.While the war of words was going on between Serbia and Australia, the government of Cameroon was trying to keep everyone’s attention focused on sport, and not on politics. The country is hosting the Africa-wide football tournament, the Africa Cup of Nations, a chance for the country to shine on the international stage. Like any contest, the Cup provides an opportunity for all countries to unite and rally behind the

Plenty of journalists have had the experience of being “trolled” – attacked on social media for what they have written or said, often in terms which can be both offensive and sometimes frightening. Tessa Wong was trolled after reporting on China, but rather than simply accepting the abuse, she tried to find out why so many people had launched these attacks. What she found was that some of them were not the spontaneous outbursts of outraged citizens which they might have appeared. Rather it seems that key social media political influencers are being encouraged in their work by the Chinese authorities.It should have been a fairly straight-forward task for our reporter in the Seychelles, Patrick Muirhead. A financial scandal has hit the island nation, and various high profile people have been accused of taking money intended for its citizens. Patrick was in court to cover the proceedings, and was also offered the chance to interview the Seychelles’ President about the affair. However, this is a small country, an

What are you hoping for in the twelve months ahead? What might you be fearing? These are questions which we often ask ourselves at this time of year, and yet it is hard to imagine a year when they have felt quite so pressing. In this special, New Year’s Day edition of From Our Own Correspondent, we hear about sentiment both optimistic and pessimistic, and about the efforts people are making to rebuild after a year of loss. Plus there is a look at why many people seem to be optimistic, whatever the challenges ahead.2021 saw terrible, weather-related destruction, which many blamed on climate change. In California, more than eight thousand major fires broke out, their number and intensity a marked increase on what is normally seen there. Justin Rowlatt witnessed the resulting devastation, but says that amidst the burned out ruins, people were still holding out hope of recovery and reconstruction.There was plenty of destruction in 2021 that did not come from nature, war continuing to take its toll in many parts o

What is it like to spend years saving up your money, and then watch as its value rapidly declines? Or to have a pension which no longer pays for even your basic needs? Inflation in Turkey is soaring, with some estimates putting the annual rate at fifty percent. The Covid pandemic has meant that prices are rising around the world, but Turkey's particularly high figure has led some to blame the unorthodox economic policies of the country’s President, Recep Tayyip Erdogan. Ayla Jean Yackley visited an Istanbul market to hear more.When our correspondent in Colombia contracted Covid, he assumed he would get the medical treatment he needed; after all, he did have health insurance. However, that was not how it turned out, and in the process, Matthew Charles got a first-hand picture of how things work in the Colombian healthcare system: who gets the help they need, and why it is they who get it.Denmark’s capital, Copenhagen, has a problem with street prostitution, in the sense that prostitutes and clients sometimes h

Madagascar is the second largest island nation in the world, yet quietly, largely unreported, its people are falling into starvation. 1.3 million are already suffering what’s called “severe food insecurity,” with the United Nations warning of worse to come. The World Food Programme says climate change is at the root of the problem, while others blame poverty and government mismanagement. Catherine Byaruhanga visited the stricken villages.They are still finding dead bodies on the borderland between Poland and Belarus, a few of the thousands who tried to cross over, most of them originally from the Middle East. Poland was accused of breaking international law when it refused to let them in. and at least a dozen died from hypothermia while trapped between the two countries. Lucy Ash has found that the crisis also left some of the border guards themselves suffering psychological damage, from what proved to be a traumatic experience.It is never great to lose an election, particularly if you happen to be in power a

This year's surprise international television success is the dystopian South Korean series, Squid Game, which imagines people competing in a series of ever more violent contests, hundreds dying along the way. The show is a shameless satire on the cut-throat competitiveness of ordinary South Korean life; some characters explicitly state they are taking part in the tournament because it is no worse than how they were living anyway. When Chloe Hadjimatheou went to South Korea recently, she could see what the programme’s creators were getting at.It is not just the death toll in Ethiopia that is so disturbing but also the manner by which many people are dying: civilians have been murdered in ethnically-based violence, while others have starved. Both sides have accused the other of committing atrocities, while denying any carried out by their own people. This war-of-words is being played out on social media with just as much fervour as the physical war on the ground. Our correspondent, Andrew Harding, found himself

History has long seen people protest against government-imposed restrictions, designed to stem pandemics. Meanwhile, opposition to vaccination is as old as vaccination itself. Yet anyone who thought rioting in the face of disease was something consigned to the distant past has had a rude awakening this week. There have been violent protests in Austria and Belgium in response to new Covid-related restrictions. However. the most bitter street battles were seen in The Netherlands, where police at one point fired live rounds. Anna Holligan was there.Ever since the coronavirus first appeared, it has caused social division: between those in favour of and against lockdown, or pro and anti-vaccination, and also between those able to carry on working and those who could not. Yet these splits came at a time when many believe the world was already increasingly polarised, and there were signs of that in Chile this week, where the first round of presidential elections were held. Centrist candidates were eliminated, and th

During the Cold War, the border between NATO countries and the Soviet bloc was heavily fortified, each side fearing the other might one day roll across it in their tanks. Since then, alliances have shifted, and Poland is now firmly within the western military ambit. But that means it is also on the front line in what some call a new Cold War, facing Belarus, a staunch ally of Russia. And these days, Poland is not worrying about tanks crossing any time soon, but people: the asylum seekers who were mustered on the Belarus side. As Nick Beak explains, most seemed desperate to cross over.There have been several thousand attempts by asylum seekers to cross into Poland from Belarus. Compare that figure to the situation in Turkey, which now plays host to four million people who fled there, most of them escaping the civil war in neighbouring Syria. Turkey and its President won international praise for accepting these new arrivals, and devoted considerable resources to providing them with food and housing. However, it

Kate Adie presents reporters' despatches from Ethiopia, the Cop26 climate summit, Switzerland, Georgia and Brazil.The conflict in Ethiopia has left the country's northern Tigray region largely cut off, with millions facing starvation. Among the many combatants now on manoeuvres are the “Oromo Liberation Army” – the Oromo being a people who live mostly in the centre and south of the country. Catherine Byaruhanga was given a rare invitation to meet them.Ethiopia is one of the countries most vulnerable to the effects of climate change - the subject of the Cop26 summit in Glasgow. Among those attending were the BBC’s David Shukman, a veteran of ten previous Cops, and someone who has watched at close hand the long battle to see the dangers of climate change.The ski industry is already preparing for warmer temperatures, with predictions that the snow at many resorts will regularly melt, or never form in the first place. So what can these resorts do to stay in business? Simon Mills reports from Switzerland.After for

The news from Afghanistan is ever more dire. Twenty three million people are at risk of starvation, according to the World Food Programme, a fate which gets ever nearer as winter approaches. For international donors and aid agencies, this presents an acute dilemma: whether or not to work with the Afghan authorities to try to solve this crisis. To do so might require handing over food and other supplies to the Taliban government, a regime which no country even recognises. That is because nobody is quite sure just what kind of rulers the Taliban will be. Since they took over in August, there have been reports of brutality, which in some cases meant the cold-blooded murder of people who were seen as Taliban opponents. Yet there have not been the kind of mass atrocities which many feared. Visiting Kabul, Andrew North has found a variety of attitudes among the Taliban members he’s come across, and they include his next door neighbours.They held a mass funeral in Sierra Leone, after a hundred and fifteen people wer

Bosnia was the site of Europe's worst conflict Europe since the Second World War ended. Fighting there in the 1990s ended up killing around a hundred thousand people. Bosnian Serbs were pitted against Croats, and Muslim so-called Bosniaks. This was an old-fashioned battle for territory, and it only ended when a compromise was reached – that Bosnia would remain one country, but with two regions each having a certain degree of autonomy. There would be one, predominantly Serb region, and another joint Croat and Muslim. This was always a fragile solution, a fudge, some said, to ease the country away from bloodshed. But now, bits of that peace deal are beginning to look rather frayed, and some have even spoken of a return to fighting. While few predict war any time soon, Guy Delauney say this is still highly dangerous talk.You can understand why Poles are just a little sensitive about being told what to do by outsiders. Their country has suffered repeated invasion and occupation, and at times, has vanished off th

All eyes are on the COP summit on climate change, its delegates charged with the task of limiting CO2 emissions for decades to come. The mood music beforehand has not been positive, but then this summit represents one of the greatest challenges of all times in terms of diplomacy: persuading many countries to take a short-term economic hit, in return for the long term, greater good of the planet. This would be a tough call at any time, but the times now seem particularly challenging for reaching agreement, according to James Landale. He was at the G20 summit of wealthy nations which has just finished in Rome, a prelude to the COP event. He says even there, it was clear that multilateral cooperation is just not in vogue at the moment.India has a reputation as a country where families of the rich and famous are particularly protected from misfortune, not having to play by the same rules as lesser mortals. However, it seems that now depends on what kind of fame and wealth you are related to. This has been brought

There have been reports from Afghanistan of people so desperate for food they have been selling their own children to raise the money they need. Our correspondent Yogita Lemaye was initially sceptical mood as she investigated whether locals really were trading their sons and daughters for cash - and what would then happen to them.For many years, Andrew Roy has been dispatching BBC correspondents around the world, most recently in his role as head of foreign newsgathering. He is about to leave the BBC, and warns that he is doing so at a time when there is more effort than ever being made to stop journalists doing their jobs. This might be military dictators wielding the threat of imprisonment, or democratically-elected governments using more subtle means of obstruction.World leaders are gathering for a two week summit in Glasgow, with an aim no less ambitious than saving the planet from the harmful effects of climate change. One problem which climate change is predicted to cause is an increase in flooding; war

Sudan has this week experienced yet another military coup, with generals seizing power, locking up elected officials and declaring a state of emergency. They insist this was all done in order to help the country move towards democracy; they have promised elections, though not until 2023. It is only two years since a popular uprising overthrew Sudan’s long-term autocratic leader, Omar Al-Bashir, and some hoped this would finally usher in an era of democratic rule. But as Andrew Harding explains, these hopes now seem remote.A long way southwards from Sudan, on the continent's Atlantic tip, there is a country where in some ways, democracy is thriving. South Africa has lively political debate, a diverse media scene, and elections which are broadly seen as free and fair. The country is about to hold another round of local council elections next week, and this was precisely what many people fought, and indeed died for in South Africa. Under the previous, apartheid system, only white people could vote for the countr

The French political scene has a new kid on the block, or one might say, a new veteran. Eric Zemmour is his name, not one familiar in the UK, but Zemmour has long been well known in his own country as a right-wing television presenter. His controversial pronouncements on race, religion and immigration have in the past got him into legal trouble, but now he appears to be flirting with the idea of standing to be president. Until now, the French far-right scene has been dominated by one political party – indeed you might say, by one family. The Front National was founded nearly fifty years ago by Jean-Marie Le Pen. His daughter Marine then took over its leadership, though she changed the party’s name to “National Rally.” Ms Le Pen had been seen as a serious challenger for the French presidency, in elections to be held next year. Yet some think she’s now being eclipsed by Mr Zemmour. Lucy Williamson went to see him in action:It looks like Joseph Biden will not be allowed to forget the way US troops departed from

Libya has been marking an anniversary of sorts this week: ten years since the dictator Colonel Muammar Gaddafi was killed, having been toppled from power as part of the Arab Spring. Since then, elections have been held, and a much-delayed election for a new President is due at the end of this year. But few have much faith in this process. Whole swathes of Libya are beyond the control of the national government in Tripoli. So it’s perhaps not surprising in these circumstances that some Libyans are nostalgic for the days of Gaddafi’s rule, despite the human rights abuses which took place. Among those who remain loyal is the man who was once Gaddafi’s advisor, and sometime interpreter. Tim Whewell has been talking to him.Democracy in Libya may be very much a work in progress, but here in Europe, there are some who feel that long-standing democracies are also being threatened. The murder in Britain of the MP, David Amess was described by many as an attack on democracy itself. And that suggestion had echoes from a

When western troops overthrew Saddam Hussein, the argument was that this would turn Iraq from a dictatorship into a democracy. And they have indeed held elections there; the latest vote for a new Iraqi parliament took place last Sunday. Yet when it comes to actually voting, tribal and religious affiliation appear to have trumped any ideological leanings, and with a heavy dose of apathy and disillusionment thrown in, says Lizzie Porter.As with Iraq, Japan also faces much disillusionment with democratic politics. The last election saw only a little over half the voting population turn out, and it’s not hard to see why: in almost every single contest, the same party has won. Now, the Liberal Democrat Party has chosen a new leader, and he automatically became interim prime minister, pending a general election later this month. It is an election nobody expects him to lose, but was the country’s new leader welcomed with great excitement and fanfare? Hardly, says Rupert Wingfield-Hayes:According to mythology, Rome w

Stories from France, Burkina Faso, Tajikistan, Austria and Turkey.It's fifty years since the release of “The French Connection,” a fast-moving cops and gangsters thriller, which focused attention on Marseille, and the drug dealers based there. Half a century on, much has changed in this southern French city; some areas have been gentrified, while the port has had a substantial makeover. And yet, the presence of the drug trade remains, and now the French President has stepped in. With a wave of drug related killings in Marseille this year, Emmanuel Macron is paying a high profile visit, promising to help tackle these problems. Chris Bockman explains that many there feel they’ve heard it all before: He was known as “Africa’s Che,” and like Che Guevara, Thomas Sankara died young at the hands of gunmen who apparently took exception to his leftist policies. Yet Sankara was no jungle guerrilla – he was the President of Burkina Faso. And he was killed during a coup in the West African nation. Thirty-four years later

In recent weeks, images of thousands of Haitian migrants living in squalid conditions in a temporary camp in Texas have caused widespread shock and anger in the United States. US Border patrol agents on horseback forced many of them back across the Rio Grande into Mexico. Thousands more were deported back to Haiti, which is in the grip of its deepest economic and political crisis for years. The US Special Envoy to Haiti, Daniel Foote, resigned last month in protest at the Biden Administration’s deportations policy, which he described as “inhumane” and “counterproductive”. Some of the migrants say it was also arbitrary, with no clarity about the process deciding who made it into the US and who was sent home. Will Grant met two families, at the US-Mexico border and in Haiti, whose journeys north came to very different ends:Last year, Thailand was rocked by student-led protests, which for the first time broke a taboo on criticising the monarchy. But the Thai government led by General Prayuth Chan-ocha fought bac