"Been Playing Spot the AKs in the Wild Out Here"
Getting the story right means taking risks. We have what it takes to go above and beyond.
Dear Reader,
Check out this text I got from our Editor-At-Large Kang-Chun Cheng one afternoon. At the time, KC was traveling from her home base of Nairobi, Kenya to neighboring South Sudan with support from The Uproot Project Fellowship; she would later head south to Tanzania.
Such text exchanges are part of the daily reality of reporting from conflict zones: that’s the risk we assume to shed light on these issues you never hear about from legacy media.
As far as we can tell, KC is only the second foreign journalist to reach the disputed Ilemi Triangle since COVID-19 began. South Sudan has only barely emerged from a decade-long civil war, and even politically stable Tanzania has seen violent internal repression targeting minorities.
In each of these three locations, climate change is driving up conflict in different ways: The Ilemi Triangle is drying up, floods along the White Nile have displaced up to a million South Sudanians, while the Maasai tribe has fallen victim to carbon-trading schemes by Emirati oil barons.
We protect KC and other freelance journalists we work with in the Global South and the American South by doing our due diligence with paperwork, and providing frequent check-ins. This labor-intensive work could not have been possible without your support: we currently receive close to $200/month from our Sustain Our Photojournalism! tier members — just enough to cover KC’s eVisa to enter South Sudan.
KC’s series “Peril in East Africa” is now live on our website. Give it a read and share it with a friend!
Yours sincerely,
Alex Ip
Publisher and Editor
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THINGS YOU SHOULD READ
✨ NEWS BEHIND THE NEWS
💰 Thank you to Sean, Anonymous and Margaret Buzbee, our new donors and sustained!
🟦 We are reaching 15,000 followers on Bluesky! Huzzah!
📱 We’re also piloting a WhatsApp channel, which would help reach users who stay off social media, and curb misinformation at the source (share it with your immigrant parents, aunties, or uncles!)
🍑 A SOUTHERN FLAIR
ATLANTA — Cameras have appeared outside homes of Atlanta’s ‘Cop City’ activists. Why are they there? (Timothy Pratt, The Guardian)
Atlanta police spokesperson Chata M Spikes initially responded to an email query from the Guardian by saying: “I’m not sure which boxes you’re referring to.” After receiving a follow-up email with a photo of one of them attached, the agency said: “Due to possible on-going investigations, we are unable to answer any questions related to your inquiry.”
Georgia — Georgia publicly touts its Medicaid experiment as a success. Numbers tell a different story. (Margaret Coker, The Current)
As of the end of 2024, the Pathways program has cost federal and state taxpayers more than $86.9 million, three-quarters of which has gone to consultants [...]
A mere 6,500 participants have enrolled 18 months into the program, approximately 75% fewer than the state had estimated for Pathways’ first year. Thousands of others never finished applying, according to the state’s data, as reports of technical glitches mounted. The state also never hired enough people to help residents sign up or to verify that participants are actually working, as Georgia required, federal officials and state workers said.ORLANDO, Fla. — Plan to Build a Road With Radioactive Waste in Florida Prompts Legal Challenge Against the EPA (Amy Green, Inside Climate News)
“Part of what makes this process so alarming, it’s not just a one-off science experiment. It’s being billed as the intermediate step between laboratory testing and full-scale implementation of the idea. So our concern is that whatever methodology is used for this project will be used for national approval down the road.”
— Ragan Whitlock, Florida staff attorney, Center for Biological Diversity
COLUMBUS, Ga. — Hundreds pleaded for less fossil fuels in Georgia Power’s energy plans. Why no change? (Kala Hunter and Margaret Walker, Columbus Ledger-Enquirer)
The vast majority of those comments have opposed Georgia Power’s plans, and about 42% of all comments made to the PSC have urged the commissioners to require that Georgia Power use more renewable energy, consider the climate crisis and protect Georgians from the dangers of burning fossil fuels. But the five-member panel hasn’t listened to those comments – they have approved Georgia Power’s requests despite the opposition, and some commissioners have even suggested that the residents urging more renewable energy make up only a small minority of the state’s power customers.
🗺️ WHAT ELSE WE'RE READING
Whisper Networking (Meghnad Rose, Columbia Journalism Review)
Psst began accepting submissions on Inauguration Day. “We’re probably going to be quite busy in the next four years,” Amber Scorah, one of the founders, said.
TEXAS – Texas Banned Abortion. Then Sepsis Rates Soared. (Lizzie Presser, Andrea Suozzo, Sophie Chou and Kavitha Surana, ProPublica)
The rate of sepsis shot up more than 50% for women hospitalized when they lost their pregnancies in the second trimester, ProPublica found.
The surge in this life-threatening condition, caused by infection, was most pronounced for patients whose fetus may still have had a heartbeat when they arrived at the hospital.
(SOME OF) THE XYLOM’S RECENT STORIES
🇹🇿🦌 UAE Oil Barons “Conserve” Tanzania’s Rich Lands by Pushing Out Indigenous Communities
Thousands of Maasai tribesmen near the Serengeti have been violently evicted by a coalition of Tanzanian state security forces and wealthy Arab tycoons who leverage carbon credit schemes to turn a profit.
🇸🇸🧑🦽 Fragile, Flooded South Sudan Asks: What About Those With Disabilities?
South Sudan, fresh off a civil war and economic crisis, is struggling to respond to record levels of flooding. It is even less prepared to support those with disabilities.
🔺🔫 Can The Ilemi Triangle’s Forgotten Pastoralists Trade Arms for Peace?
For pastoralists living in this slice of disputed land between Kenya, South Sudan, and Ethiopia, borders are social constructs, but the dwindling of water and natural resources isn't.