Soraya Sarhaddi Nelson
Special correspondent Soraya Sarhaddi Nelson is based in Berlin. Her reports can be heard on NPR's award-winning programs, including Morning Edition and All Things Considered, and read at NPR.org. From 2012 until 2018 Nelson was NPR's bureau chief in Berlin. She won the ICFJ 2017 Excellence in International Reporting Award for her work in Central and Eastern Europe, North Africa, the Middle East and Afghanistan.
Nelson was also based in Cairo for NPR and covered the Arab World from the Middle East to North Africa during the Arab Spring. In 2006, Nelson opened NPR's first bureau in Kabul, from where she provided listeners in an in-depth sense of life inside Afghanistan, from the increase in suicide among women in a country that treats them as second class citizens to the growing interference of Iran and Pakistan in Afghan affairs. For her coverage of Afghanistan, she won a Peabody Award, Overseas Press Club Award, and the Gracie in 2010. She received the Elijah Parish Lovejoy Award from Colby College in 2011 for her coverage in the Middle East and Afghanistan.
Nelson spent 20 years as newspaper reporter, including as Knight Ridder's Middle East Bureau Chief. While at the Los Angeles Times, she was sent on extended assignment to Iran and Afghanistan following the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks. She spent three years an editor and reporter for Newsday and was part of the team that won the 1997 Pulitzer Prize for covering the crash of TWA Flight 800.
A graduate of the University of Maryland, Nelson speaks Farsi, Dari and German.
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The fence dramatically reduced the number of crossings. In 2015, as many as 3,000 migrants crossed daily, now only about 30 asylum seekers a day have been officially allowed to enter Hungary.
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A play based on the experiences of one of the few journalists to have reported from behind ISIS lines is causing controversy. Critics are wary of how students will receive the sensitive themes. -
The chancellor announced on Sunday she'll seek another term. "This election will be even more difficult than those we have had before as we are facing a strong polarization," she says.
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German Chancellor Angela Merkel, the most important voice for liberal democracy in Europe, announced on Sunday that she will run for another term in 2017.
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President Obama's last overseas tour takes him to Berlin on Thursday, where he'll meet with German Chancellor Angela Merkel — the most prominent European leader standing against growing nationalist populism.
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France began clearing the sprawling migrant camp in the northern city of Calais on Monday. The camp, known as "The Jungle," has been home to more than 6,500 migrants who have fled war and poverty. France plans to resettle the migrants in 450 centers around the country.
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The refugee camp known as The Jungle is located in the northern port city of Calais. Police have started removing thousands of migrants from the camp, and they're not happy about leaving.
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France says the unofficial migrant camp on the north coast of the country will be demolished "within days." That means up to 10,000 asylum-seekers are being resettled at centers across France.
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Leaders met in Berlin on Wednesday in an effort to revive a peace agreement for Eastern Ukraine. The Minsk peace accords were signed last year, but have done little to stop the fighting.
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The leaders of France, Germany, Ukraine and Russia will meet in Berlin Wednesday in an attempt to revive the Minsk peace agreement for Eastern Ukraine. But the two Western leaders say they also plan to question Russia's Vladimir Putin about his bombing campaign in Syria.
