The unforgettable television interviews stemming from the perils of war-zone reporting keep rolling in. First it was Lara Logan talking to CBS colleagues about the death of Marie Colvin in Syria.
Now, Nada Bakri, the wife of deceased New York Times foreign correspondent Anthony Shadid and a journalist herself, has sat down with CNN’s Erin Burnett. The result is more honest, probing material on the lives affected by those who risk theirs to bring news from conflicted regions.
“I’m still trying to get my head around it,” said Bakri, referring to Shadid’s death last month from an asthma attack as he evacuated from an assignment in Syria. She and Burnett discussed the perils of Shadid’s work — perils of which Bakri was clearly well aware.
The end of the interview underscores the enormity of the risk involved in reporting from the field on today’s Middle East. In an emotional stretch, Bakri confesses to being “a little mad at journalism . . . even though he loved it, yeah. It’ll just always be hard to do this thing that we did together and we loved doing together so much — it’ll be hard to do it alone.”
