My picture of the heavily wounded Malick (17) was nominated for the 2026 edition of the Zilveren Camera, the most important photojournalism prize in The Netherlands. The photo is part of the Zilveren Camera exhibition, which will tour through The Netherlands throughout 2026. Click here to read more, on the Zilveren Camera website.
My last story for de Volkskrant as Africa correspondent was in the paper last weekend.
For that piece, I spoke with comic book artists from various African countries. I was eager to speak with them, as they play a significant role in decolonizing the minds of their readers through their books.
In recent years, I've seen their books about forgotten (read: long-banned) myths and legends, about African superheroes fighting fascism, and also their books on contemporary themes like migration, eagerly read by a growing group of readers.
After all, Africa is the youngest continent in the world. In Senegal, where I lived until recently, the average inhabitant is 19 years old (!). For all those young people in Senegal, for example, who revolted and shared political comics en masse, comic books proved to be an important source of inspiration.
My latest story is also the biggest I've ever written for de Volkskrant: the daily cover and five pages feature the comic books, photos by Carmen Yasmine Abd Ali, and illustrations by comic book creator and visual artist Minas Halefom (art direction by Koos Jeremiasse). And thanks to Adriaan van der Ploeg and Geart van der Pol, the online version is also beautiful!
Many thanks also to de Volkskrant, our fantastic international colleagues, and especially Marjolein van de Water, Carlijne Vos, and Stan Putman for collaborating on and guiding all these stories and the wonderful trips they required.
On to Paris! More on that later.
https://www.volkskrant.nl/kijkverder/v/2025/afrika-comics-striptekenaars~v2284322/
Why isn't the war in Sudan in the news as much as wars elsewhere in the world? And if so many civilians are being killed, or even genocide is taking place, why doesn't anyone intervene?
I often hear these questions from journalism students, colleagues, and Volkskrant readers. The answers to these questions are numerous, so they often lead to long conversations that include how the media works behind the scenes.
But what always comes up in these conversations is the multifaceted nature of the war in Sudan. It's a complex conflict, not just a battle between two armies and their feuding generals. A major power struggle is being waged in Sudan, in which a whole range of African and Arab countries play a role.
The main sponsor of the conflict (besides countries like Egypt, Iran, the Houthis, Kenya, and Chad) is clearly the United Arab Emirates. For years, they have been providing financial and military support to the Rapid Support Forces – the army that recently carried out an ethnic massacre in El Fasher.
In today's Volkskrant, my colleague Jenne Jan Holtland clearly explained exactly what the Emiratis want in Sudan.
The article's final paragraphs also answer the question of why no one is intervening: because the incredibly wealthy country is a major trading partner for the Netherlands, France, the UK, and the United States, among others. No one dares to jeopardize those close ties.
And so the war in Sudan continues unabated.
Read the front-page story here: https://www.volkskrant.nl/buitenland/waarom-de-steenrijke-emiraten-grote-belangen-hebben-bij-de-burgeroorlog-in-soedan~bded3592/
More than two years after the outbreak of Sudan's devastating civil war, residents are returning to the war-torn city of Khartoum. The paramilitary RSF has been driven out, yet the capital seems poised to be drawn back into the war at any moment.
Read our report from Khartoum (after years of trying, we finally received permission to work in Sudan) in today's print edition of de Volkskrant. Or click here for the extended online version, with additional photos and videos:
https://www.volkskrant.nl/kijkverder/v/2025/soedan-khartoem-burgeroorlog-rsf~v2098304/
The first horrific videos emerging from El Fasher are sharply increasing fears of a new ethnic massacre. I told Yassin Boutayeb what we here in Port Sudan are hearing about the capture of this important city in Darfur:
https://www.volkskrant.nl/buitenland/niet-de-humanitaire-maar-de-zakelijke-belangen-van-het-westen-bepalen-de-reactie-op-gruwelijkheden-in-soedan-ziet-correspondent-joost-bastmeijer~bdba736d/
"Driver's license, insurance card, and papers, please." The Senegalese motorcycle officer who just stopped me looks sternly at my rear windows. "And do you have a permit for the tinted windows?" I don't. I object that the windows are barely tinted, and he even waves, smiling, at my two daughters, whom he sees through the glass in the backseat—we're on our way to school.
Then the officer straightens his face and sighs theatrically. My driver's license disappears into his breast pocket. "Get out of here, sir, because without that permit, we're in big trouble." After almost eight years of living and working in Africa, I now know the spectacle the officer and I are about to put on.
The first time I experienced this, I begged, sweating profusely, if there really wasn't another way, Mr. Officer, to solve this. But I soon discovered that the outcome of such a charade is predetermined: you give the officer some money and that's the end of the story. The longer you resist, the more you have to pay, as if the officer, like a taxi driver, starts the meter from the moment you stop.
When I discuss these kinds of corrupt antics with Dutch people who work for multinationals in African countries, they initially laugh heartily. "You always write about corrupt companies and government leaders," they then exclaim, "but you're just participating in them yourself!"
The expats then often explain that they operate the same way in business: if the local, "African" system is corrupt, and you still want to do business there, you have to "play by the local rules." Because if you're the only one who isn't corrupt, they think, you'll never get a foot in the door.
These same businesspeople are therefore bothered by the damaging "c-word," which indeed regularly appears in my articles. "There's just as much corruption in the Netherlands," they then exclaim, "we just don't call it that there." Of course, they're partly right: in the Netherlands, we often use friendlier, more vague terms for corruption, like "cronyism" or "nepotism."
Back to the motorcycle cop in Dakar. He keeps giving me a hard time about my rear windows. "So, how much do you want from me?" I ask abruptly. The officer reacts with shock: things shouldn't be that straightforward. "I'm confiscating your driver's license and documents," he says officially, scribbling something on a pink slip, which he then hands me. "You can pay the fine tomorrow at the head office." He strides back to his motorcycle.
I'm stunned. I've just been officially fined for the first time. That excitement soon gives way to grumpy mood: this means I have to prepare for a long morning of bureaucracy at the sweltering Senegalese police headquarters. If only I'd stuck to the rules.
The full column appeared in de Volkskrant.
We're moving to France! After more than eight years in Africa, Saskia, our two daughters, and I are returning to Europe. At the end of this year, we'll be leaving Dakar for Paris, where Saskia will start working as the new France correspondent for NOS.
This also means I'll be quitting as Africa correspondent for de Volkskrant at the end of this year and will be looking for new (perhaps remote) work. If you have any ideas, please send me a message.
How do you report on a war you can't even touch? This question applies to Gaza, but certainly also to Darfur, where the paramilitaries of the Rapid Support Forces are believed by many to be completing the genocide they began 20 years ago. Onlookers are not welcome.
Journalists who still want to get a sense of what's happening in the Sudanese region have to rely on satellite photos and UN reports on ethnic violence (which are also often produced remotely). Contact with civilians and journalists in Darfur is very limited.
Fortunately, an exceptional opportunity recently presented itself: Dutch Doctors Without Borders doctor Fleur Smit received permission from the RSF to work as a support physician at the main hospital in South Darfur. We've been in contact via satellite for the past few weeks.
What does she see, smell, and feel in a place where the war is so close? For a week, she kept a diary for de Volkskrant. A short passage:
"The emergency room is busy, and a Sudanese doctor is under intense pressure. There are problems with the generator, resulting in little oxygen available. In the ward, a 6-year-old girl with a congenital heart defect is in critical condition. She is breathing rapidly and short and is far too thin. Her worried parents are sitting on her bed, muttering soft prayers.
"Her blood oxygen level is low, so we decide to connect her to the only available oxygen cylinder. Then, an 8-year-old boy with malaria in the bed next to her suddenly goes into cardiac arrest. While resuscitating, we face a dilemma: who should we connect to the oxygen tank?
"Fortunately, the boy's oxygen level increases; after 20 minutes of resuscitation, the boy is breathing on his own again. Before I leave, I make a plan for the night with the local doctors and nurses." After the weekend, I discovered that both children had died.
Fleur's diary is poignant and personal, and hopefully also thought-provoking: the reason doctors like Fleur lack basic medical supplies like oxygen or oral respiration is mainly due to the very limited attention (and therefore lack of aid) for what has become the world's largest humanitarian crisis.
The article appears in today's newspaper. But the online version, with timestamps, more photos, and videos, provides an even better picture of a place that normally remains invisible.
🔗 You can read the story via this link.
Many thanks to Fleur Smit, Doctors Without Borders Netherlands, Hizkia de Jong, Mirja van Baggem, Joost van Tilburg, Monique Wijnans, and Titus Knegtel.
At least 75 people have been killed in a drone attack on a mosque in the Sudanese city of El Fasher. The city has been surrounded by the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF) for eighteen months.
Hundreds of thousands of people have fled to El Fasher in recent years, hoping to escape the RSF. But the paramilitaries have surrounded the city, trapping its residents, the Sudanese army, and an estimated 260,000 refugees like rats for eighteen months. Half of the displaced are children.
Previous RSF attacks on the city and its refugee camps have already caused many deaths. In April, Zamzam, a massive refugee camp located 11 kilometers south of El Fasher, was looted by the RSF. Estimates put the deaths at up to 1,500. The UN called it one of the worst massacres of the war.
According to a report by the UN Human Rights Commission, released Friday, at least 3,384 civilians were killed between January and June, primarily in Darfur. At least 990 people were executed, according to investigators.
In addition to the various attacks on refugee camps, human rights organizations say the RSF is also using hunger as a weapon. UN food convoys are bombed and looted by the RSF en route.
The price of basic commodities like millet has risen so sharply in El Fasher that residents are forced to eat ambaz, or animal feed. The porridge is a byproduct of peanut production and is normally only given to cows, sheep, and camels. The animal feed is susceptible to fungal contamination. According to Sudanese aid workers, at least eighteen residents of El Fasher have died in recent weeks after eating ambaz.
📰 Also read this news update about the situation in El Fasher, from de Volkskrant.
📻 Or listen to this conversation with Marcia Luyten about the drone attack and the broader situation in Darfur and Sudan on NPO Radio 1's program NOS Met het Oog op Morgen, starting at minute 11.
It's 1995, apartheid has just ended in South Africa, and the recently inaugurated president, Nelson Mandela, is seeking a candidate to serve as a judge at the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda. A bloody genocide took place in that East African country in 1994. Mandela decides to nominate Navi Pillay, a well-known human rights lawyer in South Africa who fought for the rights of activists during apartheid.
"So I do understand the word 'genocide,'" Pillay wrote last Tuesday in a letter to the editor in The New York Times. "I don't use that word lightly." The letter was printed on the day Pillay, as chair of an independent United Nations commission of inquiry, stated that Israel is committing genocide in Gaza. According to Pillay, the Israeli approach in Gaza is comparable to that in Rwanda. "You dehumanize your victims," Pillay told the news channel Al Jazeera. "They are animals, and therefore you can kill them without conscience."
The rapporteurs' findings are making headlines worldwide. Israel has reacted angrily to the genocide accusation, claiming that the report "is entirely based on lies from Hamas." Pro-Palestine activists applauded the report, although some believe it should have been released much sooner. The Dutch cabinet reviewed the report on Thursday but "does not agree with its conclusion."
The damning investigative findings of Pillay's commission could potentially be used in the International Criminal Court case against Israeli President Benjamin Netanyahu, among others. The finding of genocide is thus the latest achievement, for now, in Navi Pillay's long career.
But who is Pillay? Which legal cases have shaped her career? I attempted to answer these and other questions for de Volkskrant: the "Slotakkoord" on this remarkable South African was published in today's newspaper.
With brand-new patrol vessels, the Senegalese navy is scouring the Atlantic Ocean for "pirogues" carrying migrants bound for the Canary Islands—the archipelago serving as a springboard to Europe.
The EU has given hundreds of millions to West African countries like Mauritania and Senegal to stop migrants.
This collaborative approach to stopping migrants appears to be working: the Spanish claim that 41 percent fewer migrants have arrived in the Canary Islands.
Moreover, the Senegalese navy considers "rescuing" migrants a humanitarian duty; thousands of migrants die every year on this perilous route.
But how do Senegalese fishermen view the navy's efforts? Will this approach actually ensure they stay in Senegal from now on?
For my latest report in de Volkskrant, photographer Carmen Yasmine Abd Ali and I traveled aboard the patrol vessel Cayor to the Senegalese fishing village of Thiaroye-Sur-Mer.
The story is in the newspaper today: https://www.volkskrant.nl/kijkverder/v/2025/senegal-migratie-europa-patrouille~v1793933/
With the approval of the impoverished Malagasy government, the private sector is connecting Madagascar's rural population to a solar power grid. This approach is leading to a massive transformation, particularly in the arid south of the island nation.
Read the whole reportage story on the website of De Volkskrant.
A malaria research program has been halted by the government of Burkina Faso after a campaign by anti-Western activists. The mosquito control program, Target Malaria, receives millions from the foundation of tech billionaire and philanthropist Bill Gates.
Read the full news story here, on the De Volkskrant website; alternatively, you could read Hidde Boersma's story on Target Malaria linked here -- I shot the photos for this Volkskrant story, which was published in 2019.
