‘No Woman’s Land’: A safety guide for female journalists

BOSTON – It goes without saying that this is a very dangerous time to be a journalist in the world, a point driven home with fierce clarity and deep tragedy in the last year.

But it seems to have become uniquely perilous for women.

And on this International Women’s Day, I want to draw attention to and honor all of our heroic female colleagues who carry out courageous and powerful reporting in so many corners of the world.

And particularly I am thinking of Marie Colvin, a dear friend who was killed reporting in Syria last month for The Sunday Times of London.

GlobalPost’s own Jean MacKenzie, whose Special Report “Life Sentence: Women and Justice in Afghanistan” launched this week, is one example among many brave female reporters in our network of GlobalPost correspondents around the world. There are too many to name in one blog post.

But all of them need to get a copy of the International News Safety Institute’s new book titled “No Woman’s Land.” The book, the first dedicated solely to the safety of women journalists, launches today with an event in London moderated by the BBC’s Lyse Doucet.

Lyse is an extraordinarily talented correspondent who is a global brand for truth and courage who just about always ends up in the hottest spots in the world providing her insightful, hard hitting and always graceful coverage. Lyse was with our GlobalPost-Open Hands Initiative reporting fellowship in Egypt this year where part of our training for the top, young correspondents was focused on how to work safely in the field. I saw first hand just how generous a colleague is Lyse, who gave our team of correspondents, particularly the team of young women who broke the story of “Samira v. the Egyptian Military, a lot of her time.

The book was triggered by last year’s shocking attack on CBS News correspondent Lara Logan, who has written a foreword to “No Woman’s Land,” which includes a collection of 40 essays from top correspondents.

The proceeds from sales go to safety training classes for female reporters. It’s a worthy cause. Buy this book!