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The Fifth Floor: The Paris Attacks: A View from Beirut

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The great pyramid of Khufu illuminated with the French, Lebanese and Russian flags in Giza

20/11/2015 GMT

The Paris Attacks: A View from Beirut

BBC World Service - The Fifth Floor, The Paris Attacks: A View from Beirut

A Lebanese journalist on why the attacks in France made her think again about Beirut.

Paris: a view from Beirut; how to report Raqqa; is it the end of history in Vietnam?; I love my toxic Russian town; the original Malala; Indian writers handing back awards.

A week ago Beirut and Paris were hit by the deadliest attacks in their respective cities for decades. It began in Lebanon with a double suicide bombing hitting a market place, a school and a mosque killing approximately 40. And just a day later in Paris in a series of almost simultaneous attacks on a concert hall, a major stadium, restaurants and bars. 129 people were killed and hundreds were wounded. There followed a global outpouring of sympathy - world leaders sent messages of condolences, monuments around the world were lit up to show support and solidarity, but almost all of this was directed towards France. Many began to ask why the events in Lebanon had been forgotten. Nidale Abou Mrad works for BBC Arabic, she's Lebanese and has spent many years living and working in Paris and her reaction to what happened last week was complicated.

Reporting Raqqa
After a weekend mourning the dead the French President Francois Hollande announced their heaviest bombing yet of the Syrian city of Raqqa, described as the "snake's head" of so called Islamic State by British PM David Cameron.  But with no reporters on the ground, and where getting UGC content out is extremely dangerous, how do we report the story?  We find out from Mohammed Abdul Qader in BBC Arabic Online who's become something of an expert at mining the web for reliable information on what's happening on the ground.  And Lina Shaikhouni a journalist from BBC Monitoring.

The end of history in Vietnam
Could history be coming to an end in Vietnam? It seems that's what's being proposed by the Ministry of Education, which wants history to be abolished as a discipline in its own right for children up to the age of 15. Instead, it will be one element of a new subject called Citizen and Fatherland, covering national defence, citizenship and history. The news comes in the same week as Teachers Day in Vietnam, and Ha Mi of BBC Vietnamese says it's the main topic for discussion among teachers.

The original Malala
The film 'He Named Me Malala' is out on general release. It's a portrait of the now famous teenager shot by the Taliban for speaking up for girls education. Malala Yousafzai was named by her father after Malalai of Maiwand - a national hero of Afghanistan who rallied Pashtun fighters against the British troops at the Battle of Maiwand in 1880. She's credited with the victory over the British. Afghan journalists Najiba Kasraee and Meena Baktash tell us more about Malalai of Maiwand.

I love my toxic town
During Soviet times the town of Dzerzhinsk was a centre of heavily polluting chemical and weapons production. Long after the breakup of the Soviet Union the industries dwindled, but in the 90s the town was still named by the Guinness Book of World Records as being the most chemically polluted city on earth; nearby cities would joke about the purple skinned two headed neighbours. But what journalist Tatyana Movshevich remembers is a magical childhood, and a city full of dreams as residents found their own ways to float free of the brutalist architecture.  

Why Indian Writers are handing back their prizes
More than 100 Indian writers and cultural figures have returned national awards over what they call rising intolerance in India following a series of recent incidents, including the killings of scholars, writers and rationalists. Earlier this month, Booker Prize-winning author Arundhati Roy joined the growing list by returning a national award she had won in 1989. With Khadeeja Arif from BBC Urdu and Vandna Dhand from BBC Hindi in Delhi.

And Fifi picks her favourite stories from the web this week.

(Picture: The great pyramid of Khufu illuminated with the French, Lebanese and Russian flags in Giza. Credit: Getty Images)

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