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Category: Karen Russo | Main

KAREN RUSSO

ABC News Reporter

Karen Russo is an ABC News reporter based in New Delhi, India. Most recently Russo was based in Mumbai, India, where she reported throughout India, South Asia and Southeast Asia on breaking news and feature stories, including the international kidney racket scandal and the historic Nepal elections. Prior to her assignment in India, Russo was a field producer for "Nightline."

View the latest blogs from Karen Russo below:

Shoe throwing

April 08, 2009 1:02 PM

By Karen Russo

New Delhi, India - Whatever happened to objective journalism? Now we have journalists throwing objects.

Today another reporter threw a shoe at a politician during a press conference. This time, the man was allegedly angry about a confrontational exchange with India’s top security official.

The shoe did not hit India’s Home Minister P. Chidambaram, nor did it encourage the minister to answer the journalist’s question. The reporter was quickly taken into police custody and let go after questioning.

In recent months, political protestors have tossed shoes at President George W. Bush in Iraq and Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao in Britain.

What’s going on here? Isn’t objectivity the first lesson in fourth estate? When did journalists become activists?

Throwing a shoe is an insult in some cultures, but it’s also a giveaway that some premeditation is involved. Untying shoelaces can take a little while. Isn’t it easier to chuck a pen or a microphone?

I remember being a young sports writer proudly displaying my press badge for the first time when my mentor pulled me aside before I entered Boston’s Fenway Park.

“There’s no cheering in the press box,” he said.

I’d heard the phrase a hundred times before, but he was serious and so were the other beat writers. I sometimes pursed my lips and feigned indifference as Pedro Martinez masterfully struck out the Yanks. When the national TV reporters would arrive at the end of the season to cover the playoffs, the writers would groan as the rules were ignored and the cheering began.

It’s not that I don’t have an opinion, it’s impossible not to. But cheering, clapping, yelling…it’s not acceptable. And in every other news venue, “no cheering in the press box” means checking your personal baggage – and shoes - at the door.

April 8, 2009 in Karen Russo | Permalink | User Comments (1) | TrackBack (2)

Beheaded for Love in India

February 11, 2009 2:44 PM

By KAREN RUSSO, ABC Digital Reporter, India

Eight people were beheaded in India last weekend in what is believed to be a "Romeo and Juliet"-style love tragedy.

Police in India’s northeastern state of Bihar tell ABC News that a 21-year-old man and an 18-year-old girl secretly eloped last month. This past weekend, police say, members of the girl's family shot and killed eight members of the man’s family. Their decapitated bodies were tossed in a river.

The girl's family is believed to be wealthier than her husband's, although some local media report that the families were supporters of rival gangs, which led to the killings.

In the past several months, there have been more than a dozen so-called "honor killings" in India, usually targeting inter-caste couples. In another recent incident, a young boy was beaten and then thrown under a train because he wrote a love letter to a girl of a different caste.

The Indian government condemns honor killings and even offers $1,000 “bonuses” to encourage inter-caste couples to marry.

Corporate Scandal: Is This India's Enron?

January 08, 2009 8:03 AM

BY KAREN RUSSO, ABC News New Delhi

NEW DELHI – It’s being called “India’s Enron.” Satyam chairman Ramalinga Raju’s shocking admission Wednesday of falsifying statements about his company’s billion-dollar business has momentarily pushed aside the Mumbai attacks for India’s top news story.

Satyam is India’s fourth largest technology company with 53,000 employees. It has 49 offices around the world, including eight in the United States, and it services many of the Fortune 500 companies. Raju admitted to cooking the books, including a false cash balance of more than $1 billion. He faces arrest and possibly jail time of seven to 10 years.

The Securities and Exchange Board of India tells ABC News that it has already begun to investigate Satyam’s financial records.

Two American law firms -- Izard Nobel LLP and Vianale & Vianale LLP -- have filed class action lawsuits against Satyam Computer on behalf of shareholders of the software services firm's American Depository Receipts, according to NDTV.

Today’s Times of India reported that “amid mounting speculation over his whereabouts, Satyam management has said that it has no idea where Raju is.” The newspaper suggested the chairman had fled to the United States, but Raju’s lawyer said the chairman is in Hyderabad.

Along with founding Satyam, Raju is known for his philanthropy and commitment to helping India’s rural poor. He created India’s first emergency response system, similar to that of 911 in the United States. He reportedly donated more than $50 million of his own money to create the program.

The Hindustan Times reports that Rajasekhara Reddy, the chief minister in the state of Andhra Pradesh where Satyam is based, wrote a letter to Prime Minister Manmohan Singh. Reddy suggested a group of businessmen should manage the company.

"Our major and immediate concern is about the fate of 53,000 employees of the company. I have no doubt in my mind that the law will take its own course but as majority of the clients or customers of Satyam are Fortune 500 companies, they may be averse to do business with companies having fraudulent managements," Reddy said in his letter to the prime minister, according to the Hindustan Times.

The Securities and Exchange Board of India said that it is working with the American Securities and Exchange Commission to investigate the company.

Mumbai Streets Empty, Gunfire Continues

November 28, 2008 6:08 AM

By KAREN RUSSO, ABC News Mumbai

The view from Wasim Khan's roof reveals a new Mumbai. Instead of streets crowded full of taxis, cars and cows, the roads are nearly empty but the roofs are full of people.

Atop buildings near Colaba Causeway in south Mumbai, thousands of Mumbaikers have focused their attention on Nariman House where Indian military commandos are fighting with what is believed to be a handful of remaining uncaptured terrorists.

Khan, along with about 50 people, have been watching the fighting from his roof since early Friday morning. He watched in part because he wants to see the action, but also because it is the only safe activity while their city is under seige.

"We can't go outside, we have to stay in our own buildings," said Khan, 24. "Police are not letting us out to get food to eat."

As gunfire is exchanged and grenades explode, the crowds of onlookers yell and clap along with what appears to be military progress.

"They are cheering like their team's quarterback made a good throw," said local resident Peter Keep.

But the oddly carnival-like atmosphere betrays the somber attitude felt across the city. The ordinarily bustling tourist haven along Calaba Causeway, a street that includes restaurants, local shops and outside vendors selling everything from scarves to wooden stamps, is mostly closed.

Across the city, many people stayed home from work. Those who did venture to the office were met with a frightening reality; continued firefights throughout South Bombay.

Anand Tanna, a banker, went to work only to hear gunshots nearby.

"I made sure the bank's shutters were down and everyone was safe inside. Then I left and went to work at a friend's office down the road."

At a hospital about two miles away, dozens of victims are recovering from the attacks. Bed after bed in one ward of the intensive care unit is full of people suffering from gunshot wounds.

Australians Katherine Anstee, 22, and David Coker, 23, arrived to Mumbai on Wednesday night for the start of an eleven-week traveling holiday. Just two hours later they were being shot at by terrorists who attacked Leopold's Cafe.

Anstee was shot in the back of her thigh which shattered her femur. She is in a full leg cast, but expects to be transfered to a hospital in Sydney next week.

During the shooting, Anstee at first thought the bullets were firecrackers because of the noise they made when hitting the tile floor. She dove under a table to try to reach safety but was shot.

"When I was crawling on the floor, there was a woman lying in front of me who was dead.

The two managed to escape the attack, eventually hailing a taxi to the hospital.

"We feel lucky," she said from her hospital bed. "We feel relatively unscathed."

Maldives Swears in First Democratic President

November 11, 2008 12:07 PM

By KAREN RUSSO, ABC News, New Delhi

New Delhi – While some newly elected presidents are dealing with the financial crises clobbering their countries, others, such as Maldives President Mohamed Nasheed have other things on their minds, like buying a new country.

Nasheed, the Maldives' first democratically elected president, was sworn into office today and will now govern a country known mainly as a beautiful honeymoon and tourist destination.

The Maldives comprises about 1,200 islands, most of which are less than three feet above sea level, which is why Nasheed is looking for some new land. The island nation, located off the southern tip of India, is the lowest in the world, making it greatly susceptible to any rise in sea levels. If climate change is as bad as predicted, much of the population of about 400,000 people will be living under water. Not good.

"Global warming and environmental issues are issues of major concern to the Maldivian people," Ibrahim Hussain Zaki, the president’s spokesman, told the BBC. "Any sea level rise could have a devastating effect on the people of the Maldives and their very survival."

The 41-year-old Nasheem is a former activist and political prisoner. He plans to spend some of the billions of tourism dollars on acquiring a new homeland, possibly in India or Sri Lanka.

November 11, 2008 in Karen Russo | Permalink | User Comments (1) | TrackBack (1)

Goody Arrives and Departs from Bigg Boss

August 19, 2008 8:28 AM

By Karen Russo, ABC News India

Mumbai, India – Jade Goody’s joining of Bigg Boss Season 2, the country’s version of Big Brother, grabbed as much media attention as the premier of a Bollywood film. In other words, it was huge.

Newspapers, television and the Internet were full of stories about Goody, or as television announcers like to call her here, “Jade Goody otherwise known as Shilpa Shetty’s tormenter.”

Goody is the Englishwoman infamous for bullying India’s sweetheart, Shetty, on Celebrity Big Brother. Shetty is now the host of Bigg Boss. It is believed that Goody received about $200,000 for her appearance on the show.

Fans of both shows were waiting with “bated breath” for the reunion, according to local reports. Times Now, a local television channel, put it like this: “Will it, of course, be time for sweet revenge?”

But instead, Goody, the tormenter and Shetty, the tormented, seem to have bonded.

“They seem to have buried the hatchet and hug each other on the sets of the Indian reality show Big Boss,” said one local report.

But just as quickly as she burst onto the scene here in India, Goody has left.

The Sun reports that Goody was brought into the Diary Room, where she took a phone call. After that, she told her housemates she has cancer. Local television reports that she has already left the country to return to the UK for treatment.

August 19, 2008 in Karen Russo | Permalink | User Comments (0) | TrackBack (1)

How About Some Perfume For That Smelly Landfill?

August 15, 2008 5:35 AM

By Karen Russo, ABC News Digital Reporter, India

Mumbai, India – In an overcrowded city with a population of about 18 million people, land is at a premium. If space appears open – the sidewalk, an abandoned railroad track, construction pipes – a person or an entire family will move there.

So it should come as no surprise that when forced to search for a home, a community of unfortunate people found space in a slum abutting - and sometimes atop - the city’s landfills.

Even worse than their view of the dump is the smell which is …unbearable. And it is exacerbated by the four-month long monsoon rains.

Some of the nearly 500,000 residents near Deonar and Mulund landfills complained so much that the city was forced to find a solution. Their ingenious idea? Perfume.

For the past several months, city workers have regularly douse the landfills with a “deodorant” that allegedly mitigates the fetid aroma. But residents of the area say they have not noticed a difference.

“It smells,” said Jogendar Prasad, 42. “Yes, they do spray but the smell doesn’t change.”

Environmentalist Debi Goenka said the perfume will not help.

“I really think it would be honestly pointless to spray a fragrance because these are all active landfills and there’s new material coming in every minute of every hour of every day,” he said.

To view Karen's video piece on the smelly dump click here.

August 15, 2008 in Karen Russo | Permalink | User Comments (3) | TrackBack (3)

India's Special Parliamentary Session Allowing Criminals To Vote

July 22, 2008 8:17 AM

By Karen Russo, ABC News Digital Reporter, Mumbai

While little shocks Indians about the ever-changing politics of the world’s largest democracy, the release of convicted criminals to vote in India’s special two-day parliamentary session has raised some eyebrows. “Nothing surprises anyone about Indian democracy,” said Brahma Chellaney, professor of Strategic Studies in New Delhi’s Center for Policy Research. But, he added, “this has surprised many, many Indians.”

Prime Minister Manmohan Singh was seeking a vote of confidence over a controversy stemming from a possible US-India nuclear deal. Over the past few weeks, left-wing parties withdrew their support from Singh's Congress party-led coalition. The parties opposing the nuclear agreement diverge on their complaints - some stating they want no relations with the US, while others fear the deal will compromise India's ability to test nuclear weapons in the future.

Mr. Singh has been forced to seek the vote of support and, as a result, MPs who are convicted criminals have received an Indian version of furlough to attend the debates and vote. Although these MPs are convicted, they have not completed their appeals process- partly because India’s courts are so overburdened-and are therefore allowed the special release. At the end of yesterday’s session, the MPs were returned to jail in New Delhi. After the vote is completed, they will return to jail in their respective states.

July 22, 2008 in Karen Russo | Permalink | User Comments (0) | TrackBack (2)

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