SUDAN INSIGHT ALERT: Columbia Journalism Review – CNN Public Editor: Where’s Sudan?

3/7/19: Columbia Journalism Review – CNN Public Editor: Where’s Sudan?, by Emily Tamkin

 Freelance foreign affairs reporter Emily Tamkin examines how CNN’s lack of Sudan coverage and the wider pattern of Sudan’s decreased news value.

 Tamkin asked Judd Devermont, director of the Africa Program at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, whether Sudan was under-covered because it is African, Black, and Muslim. Devermont responded: “this part of the world right now is getting less attention than it usually does.”

 Alan Boswell, senior analyst for South Sudan at the International Crisis Group, attributed Sudan’s lack of coverage to “many newsrooms [covering] Sudan as an African story,” and that “nearly all media outlets devote far less resources to their African bureaus than their Middle East counterparts.”

 Devermont and Tamkin both noted that Gulf involvement in Sudan should increase Sudan’s news value, but Tamkin states that US President Donald Trump’s lack of focus on Africa “bodes ill for Sudan coverage,” as “news revolves around Trump.”