Hannah Bloch
Hannah Bloch is lead digital editor on NPR's international desk, overseeing the work of NPR correspondents and freelance journalists around the world.
Her first contributions to NPR were on the other side of the microphone when, as a writer and editor at National Geographic, she was interviewed by NPR for her reporting from Afghanistan and on the role failure plays in exploration. During her 2004-2014 tenure at National Geographic, she also reported from Easter Island and covered a range of topics including archaeology and global health.
From 2014-2017, Bloch wrote the "Work in Progress" column at The Wall Street Journal, highlighting efforts by social entrepreneurs and problem-solvers to make a measurable difference in the world.
Earlier in her career, she was Time Magazine's first full-time correspondent in Pakistan and Afghanistan, covering the rise and fall of the Taliban regime, Pakistan's nuclear tests, and the regrouping of al-Qaida after Sept. 11. She also established and led CNN's first bureau in Islamabad.
Bloch was part of NPR's Peabody Award-winning team covering the Ebola outbreak in 2014 and was the recipient of a John S. Knight Professional Journalism Fellowship at Stanford University and a Freedom Forum Asia Studies Fellowship at the University of Hawaii.
She is a graduate of the University of Pennsylvania and earned master's degrees in journalism and international affairs from Columbia University.
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This week, members of the Afghanistan National Institute of Music flew from Doha to Portugal, where they'll rebuild their school — and lives. They describe their escape from Kabul and future hopes.
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"We want to prove to everyone forever that we respect humanity," Taliban spokesman Muhammad Naeem Wardak told NPR in Doha, Qatar. He also said women "must have the right to education and to work." -
Risking beatings by the Taliban, Afghan women have taken to the streets to protest against the hard-line regime, its new curbs on their rights — and Pakistan's influence in their country. -
Afghans have lived through Soviet and U.S. invasions, civil war, insurgency and a previous period of heavy-handed Taliban rule. Here are some key events and dates from the past four decades. -
In a year overshadowed by COVID-19, the world saw plenty of other significant developments. Here are some glimpses of the protests, conflicts — and efforts at peace — that helped define 2020.
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Some of the most-read stories by NPR's international reporters looked at endangered rhinos, livid Canadians, Mexico's response to migrants and a show-stealing eye roll at a Chinese political event.
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Reporters from Europe, Turkey and Lebanon share their experiences covering the 2016 U.S. election — everything from translation challenges to close encounters with a pregnant Ivanka Trump. -
"You can't protect what you can't map," says Patrick Meier. He pioneered the field of crisis mapping during the 2010 Haiti earthquake, and now focuses on the use of robotics for humanitarian purposes. -
Patrick Meier pioneered the field of crisis mapping during the 2010 Haiti earthquake, compiling information to create a real time map of damage. Now he's focusing on humanitarian uses of drones.
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The attacks came at a time when Afghanistan was under harsh Taliban rule, isolated from the world and on the verge of famine. Reporter Hannah Bloch, who was in Kabul on Sept. 11, recalls the day.
