Melissa Block
As special correspondent and guest host of NPR's news programs, Melissa Block brings her signature combination of warmth and incisive reporting. Her work over the decades has earned her journalism's highest honors, and has made her one of NPR's most familiar and beloved voices.
As co-host of All Things Considered from 2003 to 2015, Block's reporting took her everywhere from the Mississippi Gulf Coast in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina to the heart of Rio de Janeiro; from rural Mozambique to the farthest reaches of Alaska.
Her riveting reporting from Sichuan, China, during and after the massive earthquake in 2008 brought the tragedy home to millions of listeners around the world. At the moment the earthquake hit, Block had the presence of mind to record a gripping, real-time narration of the seismic upheaval she was witnessing. Her long-form story about a desperate couple searching in the rubble for their toddler son was singled out by judges who awarded NPR's earthquake coverage the top honors in broadcast journalism: the George Foster Peabody Award, duPont-Columbia Award, Edward R. Murrow Award, National Headliner Award, and the Society of Professional Journalists' Sigma Delta Chi Award.
Now, as special correspondent, Block continues to engage both the heart and the mind with her reporting on issues from gun violence to adult illiteracy to opioid addiction.
In 2017, she traveled the country for the series "Our Land," visiting a wide range of communities to explore how our identity is shaped by where we live. For that series, she paddled along the Mississippi River, went in search of salmon off the Alaska coast, and accompanied an immigrant family as they became U.S. citizens. Her story about the legacy of the Chinese community in the Mississippi Delta earned her a James Beard Award in 2018.
Block is the recipient of the 2019 Murrow Lifetime Achievement Award in Journalism, awarded by the Edward R. Murrow College of Communication at Washington State University, as well as the 2019 Lifetime Achievement Award from the Fulbright Association.
Block began her career at NPR in 1985 as an editorial assistant for All Things Considered, and rose through the ranks to become the program's senior producer.
She was a reporter and correspondent in New York from 1994 to 2002, a period punctuated by the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11. Her reporting after those attacks helped earn NPR a George Foster Peabody Award. Block's reporting on rape as a weapon of war in Kosovo was cited by the Overseas Press Club of America in awarding NPR the Lowell Thomas Award in 1999.
Block is a 1983 graduate of Harvard University and spent the following year on a Fulbright fellowship in Geneva, Switzerland. She lives in Washington, DC, with her husband — writer Stefan Fatsis — and their daughter.
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In a long-running government case, a federal judge rules that cigarette makers engaged in a 50-year conspiracy to deceive the public about the dangers of smoking. Anti-smoking groups are disappointed that permanent education programs aren't part of the ruling but believe the judge's language creates a strong arsenal for individual smokers to sue for damages for their own smoking-related diseases.
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U.N. diplomats had hoped several thousand French troops would join the new peacekeeping force in Lebanon. To their disappointment, President Jacques Chirac announces that France will add only 200 troops to its 200 peacekeepers who are already part of the U.N. force in Lebanon. Diplomats fear that France's decision will have a chilling effect on the effort to put a robust force in place.
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Nawar Sahili is a member of Hezbollah who also sits on the Lebanese Parliament. He shares his views on the U.N. resolution that calls for disarmament of his organization in the south of the country, the potential source of funds for rebuilding after the war, and Israel's right to exist.
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A majority of Shiites believe that Hezbollah has won a victory. But Michael Young, Lebanese commentator and opinion editor of the Daily Star, the English language newspaper in Beirut, also hears less optimistic views, including the fear of sectarian tension in the future.
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Diplomats at the United Nations seek to narrow the differences and craft a resolution to end fighting in southern Lebanon. The United States and France are working with all parties to come up with acceptable wording, including a call for a progressive Israeli withdrawal. A Friday vote is possible, but there is still a great deal of uncertainty.
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The oil giant shut down a crucial field in Alaska Monday. But that's not its only problem. BP is defending itself against charges that it manipulated propane prices. Last year, one of its Texas refineries blew up, killing 15 and injuring almost 200. And other plants have been plagued by safety issues.
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Christians in the southern Lebanese village of Ein Abel are trapped between combatants Israel and Hezbollah. Guerrillas have fired rockets from just outside the village, drawing Israeli return fire. Parts of Ein Abel are in ruins.
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Barbaro, the horse scrutinized by many for the strength and speed required to win the Triple Crown, is now under the watchful eyes of doctors and his owners, Gretchen and Roy Jackson. The thoroughbred colt underwent emergency surgery after shattering parts of his right rear leg in Saturday's Preakness Stakes.
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The Senate Intelligence Committee grills Air Force Gen. Michael Hayden, the president's nominee to head the Central Intelligence Agency. Much of the questioning centered on Hayden's role in designing two controversial National Security Agency programs, as well as intelligence concerns.
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The former U.S. poet laureate Stanley Kunitz has died. He was 100. The Pulitzer Prize-winner was known for his expressive verse, social commitment and generosity to young writers. His career spanned three-quarters of a century.