Jackie Northam
Jackie Northam is NPR's International Affairs Correspondent. She is a veteran journalist who has spent three decades reporting on conflict, politics, and life across the globe - from the mountains of Afghanistan and the desert sands of Saudi Arabia, to the gritty prison camp at Guantanamo Bay and the pristine beauty of the Arctic.
Northam spent more than a dozen years as an international correspondent living in London, Budapest, Bangkok, Phnom Penh, and Nairobi. She charted the collapse of communism, covered the first Gulf War from Saudi Arabia, counter-terrorism efforts in Pakistan, and reported from Iraq after the fall of Saddam Hussein.
Her work has taken her to conflict zones around the world. Northam covered the 1994 genocide in Rwanda, arriving in the country just four days after Hutu extremists began slaughtering ethnic Tutsis. In Afghanistan, she accompanied Green Berets on a precarious mission to take a Taliban base. In Cambodia, she reported from Khmer Rouge strongholds.
Throughout her career, Northam has put a human face on her reporting, whether it be the courage of villagers walking miles to cast their vote in an Afghan election despite death threats from militants, or the face of a rescue worker as he desperately listens for any sound of life beneath the rubble of a collapsed elementary school in Haiti.
Northam joined NPR in 2000 as National Security Correspondent, covering US defense and intelligence policies. She led the network's coverage of the Abu Ghraib abuse scandal and the US military prison at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. Her present beat focuses on the complex relationship between international business and geopolitics, including how the lifting of nuclear sanctions has opened Iran for business, the impact of China's efforts to buy up businesses and real estate around the world, and whether President Trump's overseas business interests are affecting US policy.
Northam has received multiple journalism awards during her career, including Associated Press awards and regional Edward R. Murrow awards, and was part of an NPR team of journalists who won an Alfred I. duPont-Columbia University Award for "The DNA Files," a series about the science of genetics.
A native of Canada, Northam spends her time off crewing in the summer, on the ski hills in the winter, and on long walks year-round with her beloved beagle, Tara.
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The White House might be about to release a damning report on the 2018 killing of Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi, but it seems intent on maintaining an alliance with Saudi Arabia.
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He was Saudi Arabia's oil minister for nearly 25 years, rising to fame for engineering the 1973 oil embargo and negotiating Saudi control of Aramco from U.S. fuel giants. -
Sheik Ahmed Zaki Yamani, the storied former Saudi Arabian oil minister who oversaw the 1973 oil embargo and made the kingdom an energy powerhouse has died.
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The Biden administration has to decide whether to alienate Germany, a close ally, by continuing the Trump administration's sanctions on companies building Germany's gas pipeline from Russia.
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An investigation is underway to determine what caused a small Nigerian air force passenger plane to crash near the nation's capital on Sunday, killing all seven people on board.
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Under a new target announced by the British government on Sunday, adults would be vaccinated one month earlier than initially planned.
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Taking on two world crises, President Biden pledged to use diplomacy to end the long Yemen war and to allow more refugees to come to the US.
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Saudi Arabia got a pass from the Trump administration on the controversial moves of its crown prince. The Biden administration is expected to change that.
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Once the pandemic began, many countries prevented crew members from leaving ships. Some ended up trapped at sea for more than a year. Maritime organizations are pushing for more seafarer protections.
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The COVID-19 pandemic has trapped hundreds of thousands of seafarers aboard cargo ships, unable to get off or switch crews due to fears of spreading the infection.
