Reporters on the Job

from the September 12, 2007 edition

• A Delicate Subject: Staff writer Sara Miller Llana says that reporting her story about adoption in Guatemala was particularly challenging (see story). "Parents and lawyers involved in the adoption process feel so under attack now that it was really hard to get people to speak with me. One lawyer just hung up on me. Another yelled and screamed at me for 30 minutes, and then refused to have his name published," she says.

Parents, too, were understandably hesitant to talk, notes Sara, because this is a very private and complicated process. They don't want to risk running afoul of Guatemalan authorities. And there's a security element. "Paranoia is running high these days, particularly in rural Guatemala, when it comes to adoption," says Sara. "On some occasions, outsiders lingering in these towns have been accused of being there to find and kidnap children. I read that the British Embassy warned tourists not to take photos of children so that they aren't falsely accused and attacked."

– David Clark Scott
World editor

A boy leads a decorated cow from the high Alpine summer pastures to lower altitudes in the mountains near Bad Hindelang, Germany. Christof Stache/AP More cultural snapshots

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