Michael Sullivan
Michael Sullivan is NPR's Senior Asia Correspondent. He moved to Hanoi to open NPR's Southeast Asia Bureau in 2003. Before that, he spent six years as NPR's South Asia correspondent based in but seldom seen in New Delhi.
Michael was in Pakistan on 9-11 and spent much of the next two years there and in Afghanistan covering the run up to and the aftermath of the U.S. military campaign to oust the Taliban and al Qaeda. Michael has also reported extensively on terrorism in Southeast Asia, including both Bali bombings. He also covered the attacks on the U.S. embassies in Kenya and Tanzania in 1998. Michael was the first NPR reporter on the ground in both Thailand and the Indonesian province of Aceh following the devastating December 2004 tsunami. He has returned to Aceh more than half a dozen times since to document the recovery and reconstruction effort. As a reporter in NPR's London bureau in the early 1990s he covered the fall of the Soviet Union, the troubles in Northern Ireland, and the aftermath of the Soviet withdrawal from Afghanistan.
Before moving to New Delhi, Michael was senior producer on NPR's foreign desk. He has worked in more than 60 countries on five continents, covering conflicts in Somalia, the Balkans, Haiti, Chechnya, and the Middle East. Prior to joining the foreign desk, Michael spent several years as producer and acting executive producer of NPR's All Things Considered.
As a reporter, Michael is the recipient of several Overseas Press Club Awards and Citations for Excellence for stories from Haiti, Afghanistan, and Vietnam. He was also part of the NPR team that won an Alfred I DuPont-Columbia University Award for coverage of 9-11 and the war in Afghanistan. In 2004 he was honored by the South Asia Journalists Association (SAJA) with a Special Recognition Award for his 'outstanding work' from 1998-2003 as NPR's South Asia correspondent.
As a producer and editor, Michael has been honored by the Overseas Press Club for work from Bosnia and Haiti; a Robert F. Kennedy Journalism Award for a story about life in Sarajevo during wartime; and a World Hunger Award for stories from Eritrea.
Michael's wife, Martha Ann Overland, is Southeast Asia correspondent for The Chronicle of Higher Education and also writes commentaries on living abroad for NPR. They have two children.
Michael is a graduate of the University of Massachusetts at Amherst. He's been at NPR since 1985.
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At one Bangkok eatery, there's a beef soup that's been simmering for 45 years. Customers from all over the world come for a taste.
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Myanmar's military has been fighting ethnic minorities for decades, who want greater autonomy from the government. Now the conflict is funded in part by the production and export of synthetic drugs.
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A U.N. effort to repatriate ethnic Rohingya to Myanmar is stymied by the refugees' refusal to return 鈥� unless Myanmar grants them citizenship. Myanmar's government is refusing to do so.
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Online gaming and other digital activities cause problems in people's health, relationships and studies. Government centers treat teen boys and girls who struggle to cut down on use of tech devices. -
The chief ideologue of the Khmer Rouge, Nuon Chea, has died. He was the right-hand man to Pol Pot, who led a murderous regime in Cambodia in the late 1970s.
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South Korea's government and health officials are worried about teens addicted to gaming and their smartphones in the world's most connected society.
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Japan slapped export restrictions on materials South Korea uses in high tech manufacturing. South Korea's president says there's an unprecedented emergency in its relationship with Japan.
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Chef Jay Fai cooks everything herself over two blazing charcoal fires in the alley, using only the highest-quality ingredients to serve customers who are willing to wait several hours to nab a table. -
A single durian could fetch $100 in China, where appetite for the spiky, pungent fruit is booming. Now Malaysia wants to make the durian a leading export, and the rush to plant and invest is on. -
Thailand's ruling junta has enacted harsh laws aimed at punishing those who "defame" the country's monarchy. That's led many dissidents to flee the country, but that hasn't guaranteed their safety.
