My sister was staying with us recently on hiatus from her ICRC work and thankfully left a copy of Guardian Weekly in the house. This newspaper is excellent and I’ve definitely been converted to a reader. It’s everything the NZ Herald isn’t. Namely coherent news articles and interesting opinion pieces covering a wide variety of international news.
In quiet desperation I’ve given up on news coverage in New Zealand. The Herald these days has reduced itself to the lowest common denominatior with minimal international coverage (usually 1.5 pages), excessive sporting news and a sensational grind of high profile local crimes and political teacup storms. The remaining pages are 3 colour junk mail reprints.
To date I’ve been getting my world news from various web-sites (www.reuters.com and www.bbc.co.uk/news). The problem there is of course you tend to only select stories that directly interest you. The Guardian weekly is excellent because it gives me everything I’d get from the above web-sites and more. I’ve yet to find an article that didn’t interest me somehow.
An example is the Beslan tradegy. We’ve been bombarded with graphic coverage from the scene by local media (presumably because pictures of bloodied and traumatised children help ratings and sales)…but to date I’ve seen no coverage that has even attempted to explain what could have motivated these desperate attacks. However the latest issues of the Guardian Weekly have described Russia’s recent brazen electoral fraud in Chechnya and detailed the suspected warlord behind various Chechen terrorist acts.
Anyway, the Guardian Weekly is available from Whitcoulls for $4.95.