EXCLUSIVE: They are unlikely first responders to Islamic militants, but heavily armed cannabis farmers who once fought against the Lebanese army are now turning their weapons elsewhere.
Watch the story on SBS World News.
Known as the ‘London of Africa’, Lagos in Nigeria is the world’s fastest growing megacity, riding on the back of a lucrative oil industry and rapidly expanding economy.
A huge new high-rise city is being built on land reclaimed from the sea and it’s set to become one of the world’s most populous cities in the next decade.
But millions of residents live in the city’s slums with little access to proper sanitation and infrastructure, and they wonder if they’ll see any benefit from the boom.
Yaara Bou Melhem looks at both sides of life in Lagos and asks what’s being done to ensure that no one is left behind in the race for progress.
See more on the SBS Dateline website.
Honoured to be nominated alongside some inspirational Australian females for Cosmopolitan Australia’s Fun Fearless Female Awards.
I’m in the role model category. Get voting now!
–A Nepalese doctor takes an Indonesian woman under his tutelage and brings the gift of sight to the world’s destitute.–
Nepal’s Himalayan mountain range is one of the most picturesque places in the world. But its stunning beauty is fading from view for many of the villagers who call the region home. Exposure to ultraviolet rays at such high altitudes is causing many to lose their sight.
Ophthalmologist Dr Sanduk Ruit has made it his life mission to bring sight to everyone who needs it, regardless of their ability to pay. Known in Nepal as the “God of Sight”, Ruit has helped more than 100,000 people blinded by cataracts see again. His surgeries often take him into the remote mountains, where patients are too poor and weak to travel to his clinic in the capital, Kathmandu.
In such isolated landscapes, the doctor and his team set up eye camps, performing free, astonishingly fast surgeries using a stitch-free simple surgical technique called ‘Ruitectomy’, which he pioneered. The procedure is now replicated across the developing world.
His assembly line-like surgeries are astonishingly fast. During his time in the Bamti district, he aims to complete 50 surgeries each day while doctors in the West only do 10 to 15 on a busy day.
Now, a young female doctor from a remote Indonesian island is travelling to the Himalayas for a month-long boot-camp with Dr Ruit, hoping to acquire the skills to bring back the gift of sight to her people.
From Nepal to Indonesia, 101 East visits communities paralysed by preventable blindness and meets the doctors whose mission is to restore sight, and more importantly hope.
See more on the 101 East website or watch on vimeo
Coming up on the 101 East program of Al Jazeera English, one Nepalese doctors mission to restore sight to the world’s destitute.
Growing up in Tripoli isn’t easy. In one of Lebanon’s most volatile fault lines, the conflict passes from generation to generation.
This Tuesday, Dateline’s Yaara Bou Melhem tells a story on an unlikely friendship between two boys from warring neighbourhoods in Lebanon’s troubled north.
The boys, one Sunni and one Shia, are both rappers, and have found hip hop to be a way to overcome the sectarian divide.
See more on the SBS Dateline website.
Detained Australian journalist Peter Greste has been sentenced to seven years in jail in Egypt.
Greste and two other Al Jazeera journalists were detained for falsely portraying Egypt as being in a state of “civil war” since president Mohamed Morsi’s overthrow by the army last July.
Egyptian prosecutors have demanded the maximum penalty of 15 to 25 years in jail for all defendants.
Greste’s family say they will remain strong and hopeful “for Peter’s sake’ in the lead up to the decision.
SBS Correspondent Yaara Bou Melhem, was in Cairo with Peter’s brother, Andrew as the verdict was handed down.
You can send messages of support to Peter Greste via this email address:freepetergreste@gmail.com
See more on the Dateline website.
EXCLUSIVE: Asylum seekers who’ve voluntarily returned home from the Manus Island detention centre present new allegations that Australian G4S security personnel incited local Papua New Guineans to attack them during the riots of 17 February that left one man dead. YAARA BOU MELHEM reports from Lebanon.
Continue reading the article on The Hoopla website and watch video testimony here:-
http://thehoopla.com.au/exclusive-witness-murder/
See Gabrielle Jackson of The Hoopla speak on Studio 10 about the story:
Our film, ‘Sectarian Divide’ about Shia – Sunni tensions in Pakistan has won 1st Prize at the 13th Hong Kong Human Rights Press Awards.
Congratulations to the Al Jazeera 101 East team! Reporter, Yaara Bou Melhem; Cameraman, Trent Butler; Fixer, Zia Rehman; Editor, Nadim Shartouny – The Council and Programme Editor, Sharon Roobol.
Chairing a talk by Mona Eltahawy for the All About Women event at the iconic Sydney Opera House.
All About Women is a one day speaker extravaganza featuring men and women from Australia and around the world who tell their stories and debate issues about women.
