Joanna Kakissis
Joanna Kakissis is a foreign correspondent based in Kyiv, Ukraine, where she reports poignant stories of a conflict that has upended millions of lives, affected global energy and food supplies and pitted NATO against Russia.
Kakissis began reporting in Ukraine shortly before Russia invaded in February. She covered the exodus of refugees to Poland and has returned to Ukraine several times to chronicle the war. She has focused on the human costs, profiling the displaced, the families of prisoners of war and a ninety-year-old "mermaid" who swims in a mine-filled sea. Kakissis highlighted the tragedy for both sides with a story about the body of a Russian soldier abandoned in a hamlet he helped destroy, and she shed light on the potential for nuclear disaster with a report on the shelling of Nikopol by Russians occupying a nearby power plant.
Kakissis began reporting regularly for NPR from her base in Athens, Greece, in 2011. Her work has largely focused on the forces straining European unity — migration, nationalism and the rise of illiberalism in Hungary. She led coverage of the eurozone debt crisis and the mass migration of Syrian refugees to Europe. She's reported extensively in central and eastern Europe and has also filled in at NPR bureaus in Berlin, Istanbul, Jerusalem, London and Paris. She's a contributor to This American Life and has written for The New York Times, TIME, The New Yorker online and The Financial Times Magazine, among others. In 2021, she taught a journalism seminar as a visiting professor at Princeton University.
Kakissis was born in Greece, grew up in North and South Dakota and spent her early years in journalism at The News & Observer in Raleigh, North Carolina.
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The country has begun letting in foreign visitors, but those from countries with high COVID-19 infection rates are to be tested and quarantined. Greece has one of the lowest infection rates in Europe. -
Albin Kurti, ousted as prime minister in March, clashed with the U.S. envoy who is tasked with encouraging peace talks between Kosovo and Serbia. Kurti refused to drop tariffs on Serbian goods. -
The government says it will end its pandemic state of emergency on June 20. Rights advocates say this still won't rein in Prime Minister Viktor Orban's considerable powers. -
Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic faced a wall of screens and launched into a campaign speech as people on the screens applauded and whooped. The virtual rally drew comparisons to Black Mirror.
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Instead of leaving super fans without glitter, glam and hard-rock hallelujah, the annual event now in it's 64th year, will air a live two-hour special available for viewing in more than 40 countries. -
The lawmakers demanded Thursday that European Union leaders punish Hungary's government for using the COVID-19 pandemic to grab power via a new law allowing the prime minister to rule by decree. -
An annual survey by the watchdog Freedom House says authoritarian leaders and the influence of China and Russia are undermining democratic progress achieved since the end of the Cold War. -
The tree killer is a bacterium called xylella fastidiosa. It has killed millions of olive trees in Italy and is now threatening Spain and Greece. These countries produce 95% of Europe's olive oil. -
At least 150 people in a shelter have tested positive for COVID-19, says the International Organization for Migration. Most are from Cameroon and the Democratic Republic of the Congo. -
It's a time when churches are full, blood-red eggs are cracked to symbolize Christ's resurrection and lambs are roasted as part of family feasts. But the coronavirus has shut down those celebrations.
