Anjan Sundaram – författare

The author of the acclaimed Stringer: A Reporter’s Journey in the Congo now moves on to Rwanda for a gripping look at a country caught still in political and social unrest, years after the genocide that shocked the world.   Bad News is the story of Anjan Sundaram''s time running a journalist''s training program out of Kigali, the capital city of one of Africa''s most densely populated countries, Rwanda. President Kagame’s regime, which seized power after the genocide that ravaged its population in 1994, is often held up as a beacon for progress and modernity in Central Africa and is the recipient of billions of dollars each year in aid from Western governments and international organizations. Lurking underneath this shining vision of a modern, orderly state, however, is the powerful climate of fear springing from the government''s brutal treatment of any voice of dissent. "You can''t look and write," a policeman ominously tells Sundaram, as he takes notes at a political rally. In Rwanda, the testimony of the individual—the evidence of one''s own experience—is crushed by the pensée unique: the single way of thinking and speaking, proscribed by those in power.   A vivid portrait of a country at an extraordinary and dangerous place in its history, Bad News is a brilliant and urgent parable on freedom of expression, and what happens when that power is seized.

A Vintage Shorts Travel Selection"I arrived to find that this was a war of walkers." So writes Anjan Sundaram about his journey into the heart of the war-torn Central African Republic in 2013. As soon as he arrived in the city of Gaga, he witnessed hundreds of people fleeing their homes for parts unknown, afraid to be one of the many victims of the Seleka rebel force that had taken over the country that year, or the anti-balaka militias that had sprung up in retaliation. As Sundaram follows a jungle path from village to village, he provides witness to a burning Republic, one that is still in the grips of chaos and violence.An eBook short.

Hearing a blast, journalist Anjan Sundaram headed uphill towards the sound. Grenade explosions are not entirely unusual in the city of Kigali; dissidents throw them in public areas to try and destabilise the government and, since moving to Rwanda, he had observed an increasing number of them. What was unusual about this one, however, was that when Sundaram arrived, it was as though nothing had happened. Traffic circulated as normal, there was no debris on the streets and the policeman on duty denied any event whatsoever. This was evidence of a clean-up, a cloaking of the discontent in Rwanda and a desire to silence the media in a country most of whose citizens were without internet. This was the first of many ominous events.Bad News is the extraordinary account of the battle for free speech in modern-day Rwanda. Following not only those journalists who stayed, despite fearing torture or even death from a ruthless government, but also those reporting from exile, it is the story of papers being shut down, of lies told to please foreign delegates, of the unshakeable loyalty that can be bred by terror, of history being retold, of constant surveillance, of corrupted elections and of great courage.It tells the true narrative of Rwandan society today and, in the face of powerful forces, of the fight to make explosions heard.

An award-winning journalist courageously reveals the personal cost of war reporting, vividly recalling his dangerous assignment and confronting its devastating impact on his family.After ten years reporting from central Africa, Anjan Sundaram is living a quiet life in Canada with his wife and new-born. But when preparations for genocide emerge in the Central African Republic, he is suddenly torn between his duty to his family, and his moral responsibility to expose the conflict.Soon he is travelling through the CAR, driven by a possible spy—discovering ransacked villages and locals fleeing imminent massacre, fielding offers of mined gold, and hearing of soldiers who steal schoolbooks for cigarette paper. When he refuses to return home, journeying instead into a rebel stronghold, he learns that there is no going back to the life he has left behind.Breakup illuminates the personal price paid by those bearing witness on the frontlines of humanitarian crimes across the globe. This brilliantly introspective, strikingly grounded account of perilous warzones and inner turmoil is sure to become a modern classic.