PRI's The World » Carol Hills

Cartoon Slideshow: Russia’s Vladimir Putin

Carol Hills — Fri, 03 Feb 2012 20:03:27 +0000

Cartoon: Riber Hansson

Russia’s Prime Minister Vladimir Putin is a man in the middle … the middle of a campaign.
He wants to be Russia’s president — again.

He’s also in the middle of protests against him. So he’s staging his own support rally in response.

And Putin is also in the middle of the international outrage over the violence in Syria.

Russia sells lots of weapons to Syria and Putin (along with his representatives at the UN) are neutering any real efforts to end the government-sponsored violence in Syria.

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Cartoon: NASA’s Predictions for 2012

Carol Hills — Thu, 05 Jan 2012 16:47:55 +0000

Luojie, China Daily, China

NASA held a press conference last month to try to debunk the latest doomsday scenarios for Earth in 2012 but Chinese cartoonist Luojie thinks the space agency may have forgotten one thing.

Cartoon: Chappatte Takes a Sneak Peek at 2012

Carol Hills — Thu, 05 Jan 2012 14:48:00 +0000

Cartoon: Patrick Chappatte, International Herald Tribune

Swiss-Lebanese cartoonist Patrick Chappatte with a very funny 2012 year in review.

Show Producer’s Blog: Hidden Heroes

Jeb Sharp — Wed, 04 Jan 2012 17:10:13 +0000

One of the things I’d like to do on this show producer’s blog (check out my first stab at this) is highlight the hidden heroes in the newsroom. The conventions of public radio mean that hosts in the studio and reporters in the field are well-recognized.

But much of the essential work goes on behind the scenes. A prime example is my colleague Carol Hills.

She was a driving force behind the conception and development of The World in the early days. In fact she hired and mentored me when I came on board as a staff reporter in 1998.

These days she’s a part-time producer and editor of our Global Political Cartoons. She’s developed a unique beat devoted to those cartoons and the cartoonists who create them. (Some great recent posts here, here and here.)

She’s on Twitter @globalcartoons.)

Her on-air chats and online slideshows are proving to be a vital link between our radio and web operations as we morph into a different kind of digital future.

Carol is also a source of endless great ideas and a conscience for the program. Just this morning she was haranguing me about Syria coverage and the importance of staying on the story and finding fresh angles (see Carol’s powerful story about Syrian cartoonist Ali Ferzat) and interesting ways into the unfolding tragedy there.

She’s right but she’s also vying for attention for a story in the context of a very big world full of complex issues that all clamor for coverage. I need colleagues like her to remind me what’s urgent, what’s vital, what’s not OK to ignore.

Thanks Carol!

North Korea Under Kim Jong-un

Carol Hills — Wed, 28 Dec 2011 20:52:04 +0000

Australian cartoonist Alan Moir on what’s in store for North Korea under Kim Jong-un.

All eyes are on North Korea as the young son of the late leader Kim Jong Il takes over from his father. Whether the latest power transition promises a new era of reform is unclear.

Cartoonist Tayo Fatunla on Africa 2011

Carol Hills — Tue, 27 Dec 2011 16:12:27 +0000

(Cartoon: Tayo Fatunla)

Africa is vast and varied. So are the news stories that affected the continent in 2011. Nigerian caricaturist and illustrator Tayo Fatunla has been commenting on Africa through cartoons for more than three decades. In this slideshow Tayo reflects on some of the major themes that confronted Africa in 2011.

The Death of Kim Jong Il

Carol Hills — Thu, 22 Dec 2011 14:20:21 +0000

Moshik, Ma'ariv, Israel

North Korea’s Kim Jong Il has always been fodder for political cartoonists and his untimely death is no exception. In these cartoons look for wailing and crying, body doubles, the late leader trying to take a nuclear warhead into the afterlife, and the cartoon debut of Kim Jong Un, the “Hair Apparent”.

Slideshow: Syrian Cartoonist Not Silenced by Attack

Carol Hills — Fri, 16 Dec 2011 14:00:00 +0000

When Barbara Walters interviewed Syrian president Bashar al-Assad last week, she mentioned some gruesome examples of how his regime was suppressing its opponents.

One was the case of Syrian political cartoonist, Ali Ferzat, who was found beaten and bloody on a road outside of Damascus in late August. Nearly four months on, Ferzat is still recuperating. These days he is in Kuwait getting medical help and physical therapy. He remembers how his car was stopped in a square in Damascus late on the night of August 25th.

“The car that stopped me seemed like it was a security car because it had tinted windows,” Ferzat said in a phone interview. “Three big strong men got out of the car carrying police batons, the kind they use to control protesters.”

They broke off his car door and started beating him inside his car. Then they pulled Ferzat into their car and continued beating him while they drove around Damascus. “They put a plastic bag over my head so I couldn’t see anything and they told me, ‘This is so you won’t draw against your masters and against your president.’” The beating lasted forty-five minutes.

Afterward the men threw him out of the car while it was still moving, leaving him on the airport road several miles outside of Damascus. He needed to get a ride back to Damascus but he was left on the lane heading to the airport so he first had to crawl across the median strip so he would be on the road heading back into the city. Then came the challenge of getting a car actually stop to help him.

“No one dared to stop because of how I looked,” Ferzat said. “I was all bloody, my face was swollen, my eyes were bruised, my shirt was off. I was barefoot. No one would stop to pick me up.”

Finally a pickup truck pulled over to fix a flat tire. The driver gave Ali Ferzat a ride back to Damascus, using side roads to avoid security checkpoints. The security guard at his apartment building took him to the hospital.

These days, his hands and fingers are still not strong enough to draw, but Ferzat is not worried. “As soon as I finish treatment and my hands heal, I will go back to Syria and of course I will keep drawing these cartoons.”

Ferzat is 60 and he has been drawing political cartoons since college. He spent about thirty years as a cartoonist for government-run newspapers during the rule of Bashar’s father, Hafez al Assad, a guy not exactly known for championing free expression. Ferzat said during those years, his work was censored, on a regular basis. “Sometimes we used to just print the newspaper with white blocks and readers would understand that these blocks were for cartoons that had been censored and forbidden.”

Ferzat’s cartoons never used to depict Syrian leaders literally. Instead he used symbols, like a chair, to represent power. There are lots of chairs in Ferzat’s cartoons. But after the uprising began in Syria last March, Ferzat felt he had to be more direct. “People used to have more time to think about the symbols I was using,” said Ferzat “But now, with people out in the streets demonstrating and being killed for what they’re doing, I think directness and clarity is needed so people can see who is responsible for it.”

So in April, Bashar al-Assad the man started appearing in Ferzat’s cartoons. In one of them he’s looking at a calendar realizing with dread that the next day is Friday, a day when he can expect yet another demonstration. A June cartoon shows Assad at a podium making a speech, with a man hiding in the front of the podium instructing the crowd when to clap. One of Ferzat’s last cartoons, published just three days before he was attacked, shows Assad hitching a ride with Libya’s Muammar Gaddafi.

Ferzat actually knows Bashar al-Assad. In the late 1990s, Bashar was preparing to succeed his ailing father, Hafez al-Assad. The younger Assad started meeting with Syrian artists, including Ali Ferzat, asking their opinions on how to improve things in Syria. “In the beginning of Bashar’s rise to power, he had a whole project of reform: freedom of speech, all those things, and part of that was the start of a free press,” Ferzat said.

When his father died in 2000, Bashar took over and allowed Ferzat to start a satirical magazine, al-Domari, meaning “The Lamplighter.” For the first two months Ferzat had total creative freedom. Then the censorship kicked in. Eventually the Syrian government took over distribution, which effectively gave them the power not to distribute the magazine. In 2002, his magazine was shut down for good. But it hardly muzzled Ferzat. By then he was publishing his cartoons on the Web and getting a larger audience. That’s where the Syrian government saw them, too, of course, but that’s also where the rest of the world saw photos of a bruised and battered Ferzat after the August 25th attack.

An international outcry followed. The European Parliament awarded him the Sakharov prize for freedom of expression. It’s been followed by other honors. Ferzat said he has no plans to abandon cartooning. “I don’t have a shop or a market so I can’t easily change my profession. Cartooning is my destiny. I think this is a gift from God. And this is a human message that I have to convey.” And besides, he added, “Freedom is more powerful than any weapon.”

The World’s interview with Syrian political cartoonist Ali Ferzat was co-produced with Radio Netherlands Worldwide. Special thanks to Jannie Schipper of Radio Netherlands Worldwide.

Vladimir Putin feelin’ the love…

Carol Hills — Tue, 13 Dec 2011 20:34:08 +0000

Swedish cartoonist Olle Johansson has Vladimir Putin feelin’ the love after tens of thousands of Russians take to the streets to protest his rule.

Slideshow: Burmese Cartoonist Harn Lay

Carol Hills — Thu, 08 Dec 2011 12:49:49 +0000

In this slideshow, I am going to show you some cartoons from a Burmese cartoonist. This is the only Burmese cartoonist that I’ve been able to find so far. I am sure there are others, but lets meet Harn Lay.

Reunion Time in Tehran

Carol Hills — Fri, 02 Dec 2011 12:41:10 +0000

Canadian cartoonist Gary Clement imagines a reunion of sorts outside the British embassy in Tehran this week.

Nice to Meet You! Can You Help Me Through…

Carol Hills — Wed, 30 Nov 2011 18:17:04 +0000

Burmese cartoonist Harn Lay shows what Hillary Clinton is stepping through and around in making her historic trip to Burma. Harn Lay is the staff cartoonist for The Irrawaddy, an independent news source published in Thailand by Burmese exiles.

Get Lost, Silvio. I’ve Got A New Guy

Carol Hills — Mon, 14 Nov 2011 18:13:37 +0000

Get lost, Silvio. I’ve got a new guy. Cartoon by Olle Johansson of Sweden.

Zapiro’s Take on Sacked ANC Youth Leader Julius Malema

Carol Hills — Mon, 14 Nov 2011 17:45:44 +0000

Now-sacked ANC Youth Leader Julius Malema is a frequent subject of Zapiro, South Africa’s most famous satirist.

Here’s a slideshow of Zapiro cartoons about Malema going back to 2008.

Produced by The World’s Carol Hills.

Zapiro cartoons courtesy of www.zapiro.com

Obama Decides to Hold Off Deciding on Massive Pipeline

Carol Hills — Fri, 11 Nov 2011 19:30:43 +0000

President Obama decides to hold off deciding on a massive pipeline that would carry oil from Canadian tar sands in Alberta through six states before reaching Texas’ Gulf coast. Canadian cartoonist Gary Clement thinks he knows why.