The seventh narco sub in Pacific waters was discovered last week as the wave of methamphetamine becomes the latest crisis challenging the region.

1News Pacific correspondent Barbara Dreaver has spent decades reporting on the region from this country, including the drug battle and subsequent HIV epidemic in some countries.

Dreaver has released her memoir — Be Brave: The Life of a Pacific Correspondent — on covering the Pacific through natural disasters, military coups and criminal activity.

• READ MORE: Barbara Dreaver: I’ve never defended who I am, why should I?
• Other Barbara Dreaver reports

She was detained and deported from Fiji before being blacklisted and not allowed to return for many years during former Prime Minister Voreqe Bainimarama’s reign.

Bainimarama was recently charged with inciting mutiny over allegations they encouraged senior Fiji Military Forces officers to act against the military commander in 2023.

She is a well known face within in Aotearoa, and in much of the Pacific where 1News is screened.

This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.

• Listen to her interview with RNZ Nine to Noon

In 1979, Sam Neill appeared in an Australian comedy movie about hacks on a Sydney newspaper.

The Journalist was billed as “a saucy, sexy, funny look at a man with a nose for scandal and a weakness for women”.

That would probably not fly these days — but as a rule, movies about Australian journalists are no laughing matter.

• READ MORE: Other reports on Peter Greste’s The First Casualty
• Listen to RNZ Mediawatch

Back in 1982, a young Mel Gibson starred as a foreign correspondent who was dropped into Jakarta during revolutionary chaos in The Year of Living Dangerously. The 1967 events the movie depicted were real enough, but Mel Gibson’s correspondent Guy Hamilton was made up for what was essentially a romantic drama.

There was no romance and a lot more real life 25 years later in Balibo, another movie with Australian journalists in harm’s way during Indonesian upheaval.

Anthony La Paglia had won awards for his performance as Roger East, a journalist killed in what was then East Timor — now Timor-Leste — in December 1975. East was killed while investigating the fate of five other journalists — including New Zealander Guy Cunningham — who was killed during the Indonesian invasion two months earlier.

The Correspondent has a happier ending but is still a tough watch — especially for its subject.

Met in London newsrooms
I first met Peter Greste in newsrooms in London about 30 years ago. He had worked for Reuters, CNN, and the BBC — going on to become a BBC correspondent in Afghanistan.

He later reported from Belgrade, Santiago, and then Nairobi, from where he appeared regularly on RNZ’s Nine to Noon as an African news correspondent. Greste later joined the English-language network of the Doha-based Al Jazeera and became a worldwide story himself while filling in as the correspondent in Cairo.

The Correspondent                 Video: Trailer

Greste and two Egyptian colleagues, Baher Mohamed and Mohamed Fahmy, were arrested in late 2013 on trumped-up charges of aiding and abetting the Muslim Brotherhood, an organisation labeled “terrorist” by the new Egyptian regime of the time.

Six months later he was sentenced to seven years in jail for “falsifying news” and smearing the reputation of Egypt itself. Mohamed was sentenced to 10 years.

Media organisations launched an international campaign for their freedom with the slogan “Journalism is not a crime”. Peter’s own family became familiar faces in the media while working hard for his release too.

Peter Greste was deported to Australia in February 2015. The deal stated he would serve the rest of his sentence there, but the Australian government did not enforce that. Instead, Greste became a professor of media and journalism, currently at Macquarie University in Sydney.

Movie consultant
Among other things, he has also been a consultant on The Correspondent — now in cinemas around New Zealand — with Richard Roxborough cast as Greste himself.

Greste told The Sydney Morning Herald he had to watch it “through his fingers” at first.

“I eventually came to realise it’s not me that’s up there on the screen. It’s the product of a whole bunch of creatives. And the result is … more like a painting rather than a photograph,” Greste told Mediawatch.

“Over the years I’ve written about it, I’ve spoken about it countless times. I’ve built a career on it. But I wasn’t really anticipating the emotional impact of seeing the craziness of my arrest, the confusion of that period, the claustrophobia of the cell, the sheer frustration of the crazy trial and the really discombobulating moment of my release.

“But there is another very difficult story about what happened to a colleague of mine in Somalia, which I haven’t spoken about publicly. Seeing that on screen was actually pretty gut-wrenching.”

In 2005, his BBC colleague Kate Peyton was shot alongside him on their first day in on assignment in Somalia. She died soon after.

“That was probably the toughest day of my entire life far over and above anything I went through in Egypt. But I am glad that they put it in [The Correspondent]. It underlines … the way in which journalism is under attack. What happened to us in Egypt wasn’t a random, isolated incident — but part of a much longer pattern we’re seeing continue to this day.”

‘Owed his life’
Greste says he “owes his life” to fellow prisoner Alaa Abd El-Fattah — an Egyptian activist who is also in the film.

“There’s a bit of artistic licence in the way it was portrayed but . . .  he is easily one of the most intelligent, astute and charismatic humanitarians I’ve ever come across. He was one of the main pro-democracy activists who was behind the Arab Spring revolution in 2011 — a true democrat.

“He also inspired me to write the letters that we smuggled out of prison that described our arrest not as an attack on … what we’d actually come to represent. And that was press freedom.

“That helped frame the campaign that ultimately got me out. So, for both psychological and political reasons, I feel like I owe him my life.

“There was nothing in our reporting that confirmed the allegations against us. So I started to drag up all sorts of demons from the past. I started thinking maybe this is the universe punishing me for sins of the past. I was obviously digging up that particular moment as one of the most extreme and tragic moments. It took a long time for me to get past it.

“He’d been in prison a lot because of his activism, so he understood the psychology of it. He also understood the politics of it in ways that I could never do as a newcomer.”

“Unfortunately, he is still there. He should have been released on September 29th last year. His mother launched a hunger strike in London . . . so I actually joined her on hunger strike earlier this year to try and add pressure.

“If this movie also draws a bit of attention to his case, then I think that’s an important element.”

Another wrinkle
Another wrinkle in the story was the situation of his two Egyptian Al Jazeera colleagues.

Greste was essentially a stranger to them, having only arrived in Egypt shortly before their arrest.

The film shows Greste clashing with Fahmy, who later sued Al Jazeera. Fahmy felt the international pressure to free Greste was making their situation worse by pushing the Egyptian regime into a corner.

“To call it a confrontation is probably a bit of an understatement. We had some really serious arguments and sometimes they got very, very heated. But I want audiences to really understand Fahmy’s worldview in this film.

“He and I had very different understandings of what was going … and how those differences played out.

“I’ve got a hell of a lot of respect for him. He is like a brother to me. That doesn’t mean we always agreed with each other and doesn’t mean we always got on with each other like any siblings, I suppose.”

His colleagues were eventually released on bail shortly after Greste’s deportation in 2015.

Fahmy renounced his Egyptian citizenship and was later deported to Canada, while Mohamed was released on bail and eventually pardoned.

Retrial — all ‘reconvicted’
“After I was released there was a retrial … and we were all reconvicted. They were finally released and pardoned, but the pardon didn’t extend to me.

“I can’t go back because I’m still a convicted ‘terrorist’ and I still have an outstanding prison sentence to serve, which is a little bit weird. Any country that has an extradition treaty with Egypt is a problem. There are a fairly significant number of those across the Middle East and Africa.”

Greste told Mediawatch his conviction was even flagged in transit in Auckland en route from New York to Sydney. He was told he failed a character test.

“I was able to resolve it. I had some friends in Canberra and were able to sort it out, but I was told in no uncertain terms I’m not allowed into New Zealand without getting a visa because of that criminal record.

“If I’m traveling to any country I have to say … I was convicted on terrorism offences. Generally speaking, I can explain it, but it often takes a lot of bureaucratic process to do that.”

Greste’s first account of his time in jail — The First Casualty — was published in 2017. Most of the book was about media freedom around the world, lamenting that the numbers of journalists jailed and killed increased after his release.

Something that Greste also now ponders a lot in his current job as a professor of media and journalism.

Ten years on from that, it is worse again. The Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) says at least 124 journalists and media workers were killed last year, nearly two-thirds of them Palestinians killed by Israel in its war in Gaza.

The book has now been updated and republished as The Correspondent.

This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.

By ABC News Indepth

Just north of Australia a secret war is being fought. West Papuan independence fighters and Indonesian security forces are involved in a protracted and bloody battle over the issue of Papuan independence.

The conflict escalated after young West Papuan fighters killed Indonesian road workers building a highway into Papua’s central highlands.

The Indonesia government hit back hard, deploying hundreds of police and military who attacked the region in an effort to root out the rebels.

READ MORE: The battle for West Papuan independence from Indonesia has intensified with deadly results

Last year mass protests broke out, with civil resistance leaders from in and outside West Papua calling for freedom from Indonesia.

With foreign media largely shut out, the story of this unfolding humanitarian disaster remains untold. Hundreds have died and local officials estimate that over 40,000 people have been displaced.

There are allegations of torture and human rights abuses.

ABC Foreign Correspondent has been able to report from inside the conflict zone, gaining access to exclusive pictures of the recent unrest and speaking to eyewitnesses of the violence.

“I have to yell out to the world…because if I don’t, we’re going to be weaker and the indigenous people will be wiped out.” says one West Papuan highlander who is looking after children orphaned in the recent fighting.

“We will not retreat. We will not run. We will fight until recognition dawns,” says a member of West Papua’s young guerrilla force whose ranks include teenagers orphaned in the ongoing conflict.

“Dialogue is needed but dialogue which is constructive”, says Indonesia’s former Security Minister.

Sally Sara, with Victor Mambor, reports on a war with no end in sight.

With the rapid spread of the dreaded Covid-19 coronavirus pandemic across the Pacific and Asia many people naturally seek online assurance and news they can trust.

Facebook has seen a nuclear explosion of posts and misinformation, especially in countries like Papua New Guinea and Indonesia.

In PNG’s case the flow of quality information slowed with the lone foreign correspondent in Port Moresby, Natalie Whiting, recalled “temporarily” by the ABC although competent local journalists are striving to fill her shoes.

The small nation of Timor-Leste (East Timor) was awash with foreign correspondents during the bloody period from 1999 to 2002 when it emerged from brutal Indonesian occupation after being invaded in 1975 after the Portuguese colonial empire collapsed.

This sparked the first wave of bloodshed and violence that claimed 200,000 lives. It gained independence in 2002 under UN supervision and life has improved significantly for its current 1.5 million citizens, most still living in villages.

Through all this turmoil one Timor-based foreign correspondent, Antonio Sampaio, continues to play an outstanding role in providing timely and accurate information reporting for the Portuguese newsagency Lusa.

So timely and accurate, I was told by some local journalists earlier this month, they were positively envious. Too many scoops,

Fact check training
I met Antonio this month for a 45-minute session of fine Timorese coffee and Portuguese snacks at his favourite haunt in the gleaming new 6-storey Timor Plaza in the capital Dili. I had been in the country running fact-check training for Timorese colleagues.

During our conversation his phone rang four times. Tips from high-ranking Timorese on the ongoing political crisis before the first confirmed case of Covid-19 set the cat among the pigeons.

Sampaio apologised for the phone interruptions but agreed when I suggested his endless scoops were the result of accurate, balanced reporting and a high level of trust.

His CV, when he was honoured by Timor-Leste, is impressive.

“Antonio Sampaio been covering Timor-Leste since the end of 1990, having written thousands of news stories about the situation in the territory. He wrote about Timor-Leste for Lusa, Diário de Notícias, Publico, Expresso, Jornal de Notícias and most of the Portuguese written press.

“He followed the situation in Timor-Leste for RTP, TVI, RDP, Radio Renaissance and Radio Nova. In Australia he reported on the situation in Timor-Leste during the Indonesian occupation in the newspapers of the group News Limited, including The Australian, on SBS radio and television, including with reports on the Indonesian campaign in which the massacre of Santa Cruz on 12 November 1991 occurred.

“The work in the period earned him the Correspondents Prize in Portugal in 1991 when he was 20 years old. In 1994/1995 he won two journalism awards in Portugal, the Gazeta Prize and the Press Club Award for a television documentary on oppression during the Suharto regime in Indonesia.

First permanent foreign journalist
“He arrived in Timor-Leste in March 1999 and was the first permanent foreign journalist based in the territory – as a bureau chief for Lusa agency – until 2004.

“He opened Lusa’s first delegation in Timor-Leste and despite been placed elsewhere (Geneva and Spain) he continued to be asked to help at times of crises, such as 2006 and 2008. He returned as a bureau chief to Timor in 2014. In 2019 he was awarded the Medal of the Order of Timor-Leste. He continues to write daily with an extensive coverage of Timor-Leste.”

Yes indeed. We discussed a common link. A dual citizen, he was born in Portugal and emigrated to Australia in 1987.

First job was a copyboy on The Australian newspaper in Sydney. Sampaio wrote page one reports on the 1991 Santa Cruz massacre by Indonesian troops of protesting students in the now infamous Santa Cruz cemetery in Dili.

In my case, I started much earlier than him as a second year cadet journalist on The Australian’s Brisbane bureau (I was half the bureau).

Today Lusa. the official Tatoli news agency, TempoTimor and the Timor Post are the most popular news sources in the country while all of them provide a limited English service.

Facebook followers
In my case lately I’ve posted on Facebook (420,000 FB followers locally) a lot on Timor-Leste after my 38th trip to the wonderful country (since my first trip to help launch the first daily Timor Post in February 2000 with computers and other equipment donated by News Limited, Reuters and Fairfax).

Timor’s lone ranger correspondent has corrected me on more than one occasion for errors (not deliberate) in my Google Translation of various reports during the ongoing Covid-19 case confirmation.

I unashamedly join Antonio Sampaio in a chorus hoisting a local cold Bintang beer: Viva Timor-Leste!

Bob Howarth is a veteran journalist with a career that spans working in Australia (Fairfax, News Limited), London (The Times), Hong Kong (South China Morning Post) and as managing director and publisher of the PNG Post-Courier daily. He is currently country correspondent for Reporters Sans Frontières (Paris) and media training adviser to the Timor-Leste Press Council and UNDP Timor-Leste. He is also a research associate with the Pacific Media Centre.

Every morning before school, Sonal Shalveer Singh Aujla would watch the news and admire the way BBC and CNN journalists confidently presented what was happening around the world.

Perhaps it was destiny, when years later, Singh was fatefully offered a full National Toppers Scholarship to study journalism at Fiji’s University of the South Pacific (USP).

“Growing up in Fiji, I did not know there was a programme offered at the universities that provided training for journalists,” Singh remarks.

“Maybe because everyone at school was only talking about accounting, economics and science … I even considered accounting before I got the scholarship.”

After proving himself as a mature and talented student and became editor of USP’s award-winning newspaper Wansolwara, Singh was selected to take part in Pacific Cooperation Foundation’s (PCF) Media Programme two-week internship in Auckland last year – his final year of his undergraduate journalism and media degree.

Since finishing his course last year, Singh has not only been nominated for the Vice-Chancellor’s All-Rounder Award at graduation, which falls at the end of March, but also secured a job at the Secretariat of the Pacific Community as a media assistant in the Director-General’s Office.

“An opportunity which really inspired me and what helped me determine my future plans, was getting accepted in PCF’s Internship programme to New Zealand,” Singh says.

“While observing the New Zealand media, I realised there was a lot of work for foreign correspondents involved in the media industry and this is when I decided I would join a regional organisation so I could become a foreign correspondent.”

War reporting
By going down this line of work, Singh hopes to achieve his life-long dream of war reporting for a global media network.

“The internship has improved my resume and this is the reason why I am part of the media team of the Secretariat of the Pacific Community today,” he adds.

Senior lecturer and coordinator of journalism at USP Dr Shailendra Singh says Sonal Singh’s performance improved remarkably after completing the PCF internship.

Sonal Singh’s experience has made him an advocate for PCF’s media programme, and he says he encourages all the media students around the Pacific to apply for the 2017 PCF Media Programme.

“I hope that through this programme, you too may find a direction in life, just like I did,” Singh says.

The Media Programme internship is fully funded by PCF over the two-week period – including all travel, accommodation, insurance, living allowance and any associated visa costs.

New Zealand and Pacific-based journalism/media students who are currently in their final year of tertiary education can apply for this programme.

The programme also includes a field trip to Auckland University of Technology’s Pacific Media Centre and the institution’s state-of-the-art media facilities.

Applications close on March 31.

Contact Michelle Curran of the Pacific Cooperation Foundation for more information.

Pacific journalist Barbara Dreaver says she is ‘thrilled’ to be able to report in Fiji again, after being blacklisted from the country for eight-years.

The TVNZ Pacific Correspondent told Asia Pacific Report that it is a “promising move” by the Fiji government and said an open and free media is a corner stone of democracy.

This comes after the announcement made by the Fiji government this week, that it had lifted the ban on foreign journalists reporting in the country as long as they have been accredited in the usual manner by the Department of Information.

Fiji Prime Minister Voreqe Bainimarama is currently in New Zealand on his first state visit to the country.

Listen to the interview with Pacific journalist Barbara Dreaver:

• Lifting of Fiji journo ban ‘curious’, says reporter
• Barbara Dreaver: Fiji’s journalist blacklist is a disgrace

Field was banned by the military regime in 2007. He told NewstalkZB that he has still not been properly advised on the lifting of the ban.

“It’s all part of an interesting game that he [Bainimarama] is playing, because I have not been advised.”

“It’s a curious thing to do and it should be noted that the domestic media in Fiji is still governed by military decrees so I don’t know what it all means.”

TVNZ’s Barbara Dreaver has also been blacklisted from Fiji since 2008.

She has previously expressed in Asia Pacific Report that journalists should not be banned in any democratic country.

“The people of Fiji deserve to have their stories told no matter who they are or who they vote for.”

Usual manner

The Fiji government is said to have lifted the ban on foreign journalists reporting in the country as long as they have been accredited in the usual manner by the Department of Information.

The Fiji Times reported the announcement was made by Prime Minister Frank Bainimarama earlier this week who said the ban on foreign journalists was established because he believed they were not objective in their reporting.

“The government originally instituted these bans because it believed that some journalists had crossed the line from journalism to political advocacy and had inserted themselves into the domestic political debate.

“But the government reminds foreign journalists of their universal obligation to report events fairly and in a balanced manner.”

• Barbara Dreaver: Fiji’s journalist blacklist is a disgrace

But she has finally been given the recognition she deserves.

Massey University presented Dr Goodman with an honorary doctorate at its Wellington graduation ceremony this week in recognition of her achievements as a reporter and as a trailblazer for women in the world of journalism.

Her achievements include being the BBC’s first female foreign correspondent, the first woman to run one of the BBC’s foreign bureaux and the first mother to be sent on an overseas posting.

During her foreign postings, she covered nearly two decades of historic change – including conflicts in Lebanon, Libya and Romania, the reunification of Germany, post-Communist Eastern Europe and the dissolution of the Soviet Union.

“I’m enormously chuffed, as they would say in Britain,” she says. “It is wonderful to get the recognition because people are not always interested in hearing about what you have done in your life before.”

On Radio NZ’s Sunday programme yesterday, she joined Wallace Chapman to talk about her career and gave her perspective on the challenges that Europe faces now and in the future.

• Full Radio NZ Sunday interview with Dr Goodman