This International Dateline episode includes four segments: Cuba: A Clean Bill of Health, David O'Shea Interview, Endless Jihad, and Haifa Zangana Interview.
Cuba: A Clean Bill of Health
For almost half a century now Cuba has endured crippling economic and trade sanctions imposed by the United States government. But not only has this tiny Caribbean country survived, it's achieved close to the unthinkable. Over the years of its isolation, Cuba has made major medical breakthroughs and now has a health system that's the envy of most of its neighbors.
David O'Shea Interview
More gun battles have broken out across Dili, East Timor, with at least two killed and seven injured. Terrified East Timorese are fleeing the fighting, foreigners are being evacuated and now, foreign peacekeepers from Australia and New Zealand, are on the way. Dateline reporter David O'Shea was in the firing line when bullets and grenades started flying between rival Timorese soldiers in the hills outside Dili.
Endless Jihad
Over the past week more people have died in Afghanistan than at any time since the notorious Taliban government fell in 2001. Today alone, 60 suspected Taliban and five members of the security forces were killed in a major clash in the south of the country. New video footage from Kabul shows both the Taliban and al-Qa'ida have been recruiting for another battle.
Haifa Zangana Interview
Haifa Zangana is an Iraqi. She is also a writer and an activist for women's rights in her savagely battered homeland. Before 2003, she was an opponent of Saddam Hussein and his regime; indeed, she was imprisoned and tortured by the dictator. Her most up-to-date contribution to the global debate on Iraq is a piece in "Not One More Death," a collection of essays on Iraq from a string of prominent writers including the likes of Harold Pinter and John La Carre. Dateline's George Negus interviews the writer who is in Australia for the Sydney Writers' Festival.
About International Dateline
SBS Dateline, which began in 1984, is Australia's longest-running international current affairs program. It has a well-earned reputation for authoritative and incisive reporting. Dateline has taken the traditional way of producing TV current affairs and turned it on its head. Reporters who used to travel with a cameraperson and sound recordist now travel alone and have the responsibility of both filming and reporting their stories. The reporters became video-journalists, gaining access to people and places that the conventional camera crews cannot.
