May 2, 2006 — At the Shorenstein Center’s brown-bag lunch, Susan Chira, foreign editor at the New York Times, explained that journalists in Iraq are restricted by security concerns in their efforts to do in-depth reporting. Reporters face “an ever-tightening circle of where they can go and what they can see for themselves,” Chira said.
In spite of such restrictions, however, the Times is able to deepen its news coverage with reporters embedded in military units, and by pairing U.S. staff with Iraqi employees who can “get another dimension” of a story.
In her role as editor, Chira said, she prefers to encourage writers to stress facts rather than attempt to predict what is ahead.
