Tim Butcher Bücher

Als junger Kriegsreporter berichtete Tim Butcher über die verheerenden Bürgerkriege in Sierra Leone und Liberia. Zwei seiner Freunde verloren vor Ort ihr Leben. Zehn Jahre später kehrt Butcher zurück in die von blutigen Rohstoffkonflikten und archaischen Ritualen gezeichneten Staaten an der afrikanischen Elfenbeinküste. Er begibt sich auf einen lebensgefährlichen Fußmarsch mit ungewissem Ausgang, 300 Kilometer auf Dschungelpfaden von Freetown bis nach Monrovia. Auf einer Route, die 75 Jahre vor ihm der britische Schriftsteller Graham Greene bereist hat. Erneut durchdringt Butcher eine der verborgensten Regionen Afrikas und lotet aus, ob es einen Auswegaus der Spirale von Armut und Gewalt geben kann.

Allen Warnungen vor marodierenden Rebellen zum Trotz reist Tim Butcher allein entlang des gesamten Kongo-Stroms, 2.500 Kilometer vom Tanganjika See an der Grenze zu Tansania bis nach Boma am Atlantischen Ozean. In Pirogen, auf einem Patrouillenschiff der UN, zu Fuß und mit Motorrädern durchmisst er „Afrikas gebrochenes Herz“, getrieben vom Wunsch, sich ein eigenes Bild von einem Land zu machen, das gegenwärtig durch die größte UN-Blauhelmmission der Welt mehr schlecht als recht stabilisiert wird. Entstanden ist ein mutiger, äußerst lesenswerter und hoch aktueller Augenzeugenbericht über das Leben und Überleben in einer der am schwersten zugänglichen Regionen Afrikas.

Facing down demons from his time in Africa as a journalist, Tim Butcher heads deep into this combat zone, encountering the devastation wrought by lawless militia, child soldiers, brutal violence, blood diamonds and masked figures who guard the spiritual secrets of remote jungle communities.

Despite warnings about marauding rebels, Tim Butcher travels alone along the Congo River for 2,500 kilometers, from Lake Tanganyika to Boma. Using various modes of transport, he explores "Africa's broken heart," driven by a desire to understand a country under the world's largest UN peacekeeping mission. His account is a brave and compelling eyewitness report.

"On a summer morning in Sarajevo almost a hundred years ago, a teenager took a pistol out of his pocket and fired not just the opening rounds of the First World War but the starting gun for modern history. By killing Archduke Franz Ferdinand, the heir of the Austro-Hungarian Empire, Gavrilo Princip started a cycle of events that would leave 15 million dead from fighting between 1914 and 1918 and proved fatal for empires and a way of ruling that had held for centuries."--Publisher's description.

On a summer morning in Sarajevo a hundred years ago, a teenage assassin named Gavrilo Princip fired not just the opening shots of the First World War but the starting gun for modern history, when he killed Archduke Franz Ferdinand. Yet the events Princip triggered were so monumental that his own story has been largely overlooked, his role garbled and motivations misrepresented. The Trigger puts this right, filling out as never before a figure who changed our world and whose legacy still has an impact on all of us today. Born a penniless backwoodsman, Princip's life changed when he trekked through Bosnia and Serbia to attend school. As he ventured across fault lines of faith, nationalism and empire, so tightly clustered in the Balkans, radicalisation slowly transformed him from a frail farm boy into history's most influential assassin. By retracing Princip's journey from his highland birthplace, through the mythical valleys of Bosnia to the fortress city of Belgrade and ultimately Sarajevo, Tim Butcher illuminates our understanding both of Princip and the places that shaped him.Tim uncovers details about Princip that have eluded historians for a century and draws on his own experience, as a war reporter in the Balkans in the 1990s, to face down ghosts of conflicts past and present. The Trigger is a rich and timely work that brings to life both the moment the world first went to war and an extraordinary region with a potent hold over history.