Guinea, one year after the election of Alpha Condé

Our reporters Willy Bracciano and Fatimata Wane went to Guinea, one year after the country's first ever free elections. They report on a nation struggling to get back on its feet after 50 years of authoritarian rule.

REPORTERS

Fifty years of dictatorship have shattered a land rich in natural resources - bauxite, iron, gold, diamonds, fertile farmland and numerous rivers. Alpha Condé, who was elected president just over a year ago after Guinea’s first free elections, faces the uphill battle of building a country ravaged by neglect.

The new head of state also urgently needs to restore the army’s tarnished image, which stands accused of terrorising the population on a daily basis and committing atrocities.

Condé also has the arduous task of building a democracy from scratch. But he has yet to organise parliamentary elections, a situation the opposition has labelled scandalous.

Finally, after last year’s presidential elections were marred by ethnic violence between Malinke supporters of Condé and Peuhl backers of his rival Cellou Dalein Diallo, the new president must try to reconcile with all Guineans. In Guinea like elsewhere, ethnicity is a formidable political weapon, even if the Peulh, the Malinke, the Susu and the Baga now co-exist harmoniously on a daily basis. This cohesion remains fragile, and could unravel if the new government does not keep its promises.

30/11/2012 - REPORTERS

Bosnia: still ethnically divided?

It’s been 20 years since the bitter conflict in Bosnia and Herzegovina broke out, a war which cost 100,000 people their lives. It tore communities apart, and ignited ethnic tensions between Bosnia’s three largest communities: Bosnian Serbs, Croats and Bosniak Muslims. And the country is still governed along ethnic lines. Our reporters travelled to Sarajevo, Mostar and Banja Luka to find out how divided Bosnia remains today.

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23/11/2012 - REPORTERS

Nagorno-Karabakh, the time bomb on Europe's doorstep

The enclave of Nagorno-Karabakh is a powder keg at the centre of a decades-old dispute between Armenia and Azerbaijan. Its people are mostly Armenian, but under the Soviet Union it was ruled by Azerbaijan. In 1991, Nagorno-Karabakh declared itself independent. A three-year war followed, killing around 30,000 people. A fragile truce still holds, but Armenian forces occupy large swathes of Azeri land, and oil-rich Azerbaijan says it will take back the territories by force if there's no peace deal.

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16/11/2012 - REPORTERS

The Ivorian Gold Rush

Since the discovery of gold in the Bagoué riverbed, the Ivory Coast’s Kapolo mine has become a magnet for West Africa’s poorest. Tens of thousands of men, women & children work the land and themselves to the point of exhaustion. Gold fever has emptied the schools and left the crops abandoned. The stability of this impoverished farming region now hangs by a thread.

09/11/2012 - REPORTERS

Burma’s Rohingya: forced into exile

They're one of the most persecuted minorities on earth. Descendants of Muslim merchants, the Rohingya settled in Burma centuries ago. But in 1982, a law took away their nationality as well as their rights to property, marriage and education. Now a dispute between Buddhists and the Rohingya has reopened old wounds and sparked deadly violence. Forced into exile, the Rohingya have poured into camps in neighbouring Bangladesh. An undercover FRANCE 24 team went to meet them.

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02/11/2012 - REPORTERS

Lost Vegas

For decades, Las Vegas symbolised the American dream. But the economic crisis has hit hard. Today's recession has left Americans and foreign visitors with less cash to spend in the casinos. The glitz has given way to unemployment, uncertainty and evictions. Once Nevada’s leading source of tourism, Las Vegas is now dragging the entire state down.