That moment unforeseen

The world of journalism lost two giants of the trade last month with the deaths of Anthony Shadid, the Middle East correspondent for The New York Times, and Marie Colvin, a veteran war correspondent for Britain’s Sunday Times. Both died in Syria — Shadid from a fatal asthma attack while heading to the Turkish border after spending several days with the rebel Free Syrian Army, and Colvin from an exploding artillery shell in Homs from where she had been reporting for a week. Their deaths have provoked once more, among journalists covering conflict zones, deep introspection on how to assess the critical balance between the need to report a story to the outside world and the risks involved in obtaining it. The demands to produce material combined with ever growing numbers of correspondents covering the same story — from newly arrived hopefuls looking for a big break to seasoned veterans