BULLETS AND BYLINES REPORTING WAR FROM KABUL, DELHI, DAMASCUS AND BEYOND

War reporters tend to have shorter lives than most journalists, simply becausethey are exposed to more day-to-day risks in some of the world’s most violentplaces. Shyam Bhatia is one of the lucky few who has lived to recall andrecount unique survival stories, including his eyewitness experience of a minimassacre on the Kabul to Kandahar highway, followed by his own detention,torture and daily threats of execution by the Mujahideen.The Afghan experience was followed by an equally chilling episode insouthern Sudan where Bhatia’s media convoy drove over a carefully concealedlandmine, resulting in one colleague’s death and injuries to several others.Just as gripping are his accounts of uncovering mass murders in Delhi in1984, breaking the story of the Israeli-Egyptian peace treaty, as well as hisencounter with the besieged Marsh Arabs of Iraq that won him the ForeignJournalist of the Year award.Bhatia also recounts memorable encounters with, among others, thelegendary Yasser Arafat, leader of Palestine; and Benazir Bhutto before sherose to power in Pakistan.This first-hand account of life as a foreign correspondent is packed withdrama, danger, and fascinating, sometimes hilarious, anecdotes. It is also avaluable and compelling slice of late-twentieth-century history as it was madein the war zones of South Asia and the Middle East.