In this the ninth episode of A View from Afar for 2023, political scientist Dr Paul Buchanan and journalist Selwyn Manning examine why there is a trend toward military dictatorships in North Africa.

And, in particular, Paul and Selwyn analyse the reasons why countries like Sudan, Chad, Niger, Mali, Burkina Faso and Guinea have all become part of a challenge to a weakened western-led global order.

In this podcast, Paul and Selwyn examine why events in North Africa are connected to authoritarian multipolarity, a realignment of global power that favours the Russian Federation’s Putin regime.

And, within this context, Paul and Selwyn address the complexities of Russian Federation involvement in the African continent – involvement that includes the notorious Wagner mercenary group; Russian state controlled energy giants like Gazprom that act as envoys of the Kremlin; and how Western powers appear unable to address geopolitical and terrorist-caused instability in the region.

The Questions include:

• How and why have Africa’s dictators found a powerful ally in the Kremlin?
• Who benefits from the Russian-North African alliance and what does this association look like?
• Where does all of this leave terrorist groups, such as ISIS, in the region?
• Why has Africa become a divide between liberal democratic and authoritarian power blocs in the emerging multipolar global constellation?

INTERACTION WHILE LIVE:

Paul and Selwyn encourage their live audience to interact while they are live with questions and comments.

To interact during the live recording of this podcast, go to Youtube.com/c/EveningReport/

Remember to subscribe to the channel.

For the on-demand audience, you can also keep the conversation going on this debate by clicking on one of the social media channels below:

• Youtube.com/c/EveningReport/
• Facebook.com/selwyn.manning
• Twitter.com/Selwyn_Manning

RECOGNITION: The MIL Network’s podcast A View from Afar was Nominated as a Top Defence Security Podcast by Threat.Technology – a London-based cyber security news publication. Threat.Technology placed A View from Afar at 9th in its 20 Best Defence Security Podcasts of 2021 category.

You can follow A View from Afar via our affiliate syndicators.

In this the ninth episode of A View from Afar for 2023, political scientist Dr Paul Buchanan and journalist Selwyn Manning will examine why there is a trend toward military dictatorships in North Africa.

And, in particular, Paul and Selwyn will analyse the reasons why countries like Sudan, Chad, Niger, Mali, Burkina Faso and Guinea have all become part of a challenge to a weakened western-led global order.

In this podcast, Paul and Selwyn will examine why events in North Africa are connected to authoritarian multipolarity, a realignment of global power that favours the Russian Federation’s Putin regime.

And, within this context, Paul and Selwyn will address the complexities of Russian Federation involvement in the African continent – involvement that includes the notorious Wagner mercenary group; Russian state controlled energy giants like Gazprom that act as envoys of the Kremlin; and how Western powers appear unable to address geopolitical and terrorist-caused instability in the region.

The Questions include:

How and why have Africa’s dictators found a powerful ally in the Kremlin?

Who benefits from the Russian-North African alliance and what does this association look like?

Where does all of this leave terrorist groups, such as ISIS, in the region?

Why has Africa become a divide between liberal democratic and authoritarian power blocs in the emerging multipolar global constellation?

INTERACTION WHILE LIVE:

Paul and Selwyn encourage their live audience to interact while they are live with questions and comments.

To interact during the live recording of this podcast, go to Youtube.com/c/EveningReport/

Remember to subscribe to the channel.

For the on-demand audience, you can also keep the conversation going on this debate by clicking on one of the social media channels below:

• Youtube.com/c/EveningReport/
• Facebook.com/selwyn.manning
• Twitter.com/Selwyn_Manning

RECOGNITION: The MIL Network’s podcast A View from Afar was Nominated as a Top Defence Security Podcast by Threat.Technology – a London-based cyber security news publication. Threat.Technology placed A View from Afar at 9th in its 20 Best Defence Security Podcasts of 2021 category.

You can follow A View from Afar via our affiliate syndicators.

TECH NOW IS LIVE on Evening Report – EveningReport.nz has launched Tech Now. The new programme features technology commentator and ComputerWorld NZ editor, Sarah Putt, and is hosted by Selwyn Manning.

The programme is the latest effort by EveningReport as it rolls out its public service webcasting programmes, produced by ER’s parent company Multimedia Investments Ltd.

ER’s Tech Now programme explores the latest tech trends both here in New Zealand and globally.

The programme’s format examines the tech world in the present and post-Covid-19 world. It looks at new innovations, what they mean to us as we grapple with the ‘new normal’. Tech Now also looks at the policy settings to see if they are a hindrance to progress or part of the solutions.

Evening Report’s Tech Now also includes audience participation, where the programme’s social media audiences can make comment and issue questions. The best of these can be selected and webcast in the programme LIVE.

You can interact with the LIVE programme by joining these social media channels. Here are the links:

• Twitter.com/Selwyn_Manning
• Facebook.com/selwyn.manning
• Youtube

Once the programme has concluded, it will automatically switch to video on demand so that those who have missed the programme, can watch it at a time of their convenience.

So join us on Facebook, Twitter, and Youtube as we will promote Tech Now via our social media channels and via web partners. It will also webcast live and on demand on EveningReport.nz, and other selected outlets.

Do bookmark EveningReport.nz and we look forward to you taking part in some robust live debate.

About Us: EveningReport.nz is based in Auckland city, New Zealand, is an associate member of the New Zealand Media Council, and is part of the MIL-OSI network, owned by its parent company Multimedia Investments Ltd (MIL) (MILNZ.co.nz).

EveningReport specialises in publishing independent analysis and features from a New Zealand juxtaposition, including global issues and geopolitics as it impacts on the countries and economies of Australasia and the Asia Pacific region.

Fear and Desperation: Refugees and Migrants Pour into Greece. Prizewinning footage shot in October 2015 – March 2016, Greece. Video: Rory Peck Awards

Will Vassilopoulos, an Agence France-Presse (AFP) stringer since 2011, has won the Rory Peck award recognising the work of the world’s best freelance video journalists.

Will Vassilopoulos won the award for his coverage of the migrant crisis in Greece.

Since 2015, the country has been one of the main entry points to Europe for hundreds of thousands of people fleeing war, poverty and persecution. Vassilopoulos’s footage shows desperate migrants and refugees arriving in the country from Turkey, having crossed the Aegean Sea in overcrowded, rickety boats and rubber dinghies — and their rescue from open water in the middle of the night.

Vassilopoulos’s entry also includes a sequence from the island of Lesbos, which has seen the highest number of arrivals.  He filmed the arrival of a boatload of refugees on Skala Sykamias beach on 31 October 2015. He followed them to the makeshift, sprawling Idomeni camp on Greece’s northern border with Macedonia – which was evacuated last May.

He depicts demonstrations by refugees at the border post, their catastrophic living conditions and the desperate attempt of several hundred to cross a river a few kilometres from the camp to get into Macedonia on 14 March 2016.

Will Vassilopoulos started his career in text for Japanese news agency Kyodo News before becoming a news anchor at Greece’s state broadcaster ERT.

In 2011, Agence France-Presse financed a training course for Will to learn how to film and he has freelanced for the agency as a video journalist ever since, covering extensively topics such as Greece’s economic crisis, political unrest in Egypt and Turkey and the conflict in Ukraine.

Battle of Aden
News category finalists also included Nabil Hassan, who has freelanced for AFP since 2015. Nabil was nominated for his coverage of the Battle for Aden in which Shiite Houthi rebels opposed pro-government forces.

Will Vassilopoulos succeeds Zein Al-Rifai, who won the news prize last year.

Zein, who works regularly for AFP in Syria, covered the everyday lives of people in the rebel-held areas of Aleppo between 2014 and February 2015.

This is the third consecutive year that AFP has taken away the Rory Peck news award. In 2014, AFP stringer Pacôme Pabandji won for his coverage of the civil war in the Central African Republic.

The Rory Peck Awards were launched in 1995 by the Rory Peck Trust, set up in the memory of freelance journalist Rory Peck who was killed in Moscow in 1993.

The awards recognise the best independent news cameramen, and the awards ceremony is one of the main events through which the trust raises funds to assist freelance journalists.

Rory Peck Trust