Olivier Weber
Encyclopedia
Olivier Weber is an award-winning french writer
Writer
A writer is a person who produces literature, such as novels, short stories, plays, screenplays, poetry, or other literary art. Skilled writers are able to use language to portray ideas and images....

, novelist and reporter at large. War correspondent
Correspondent
A correspondent or on-the-scene reporter is a journalist or commentator, or more general speaking, an agent who contributes reports to a newspaper, or radio or television news, or another type of company, from a remote, often distant, location. A foreign correspondent is stationed in a foreign...

 for twenty-five years, specially in Afghanistan
Afghanistan
Afghanistan , officially the Islamic Republic of Afghanistan, is a landlocked country located in the centre of Asia, forming South Asia, Central Asia and the Middle East. With a population of about 29 million, it has an area of , making it the 42nd most populous and 41st largest nation in the world...

, Africa
Africa
Africa is the world's second largest and second most populous continent, after Asia. At about 30.2 million km² including adjacent islands, it covers 6% of the Earth's total surface area and 20.4% of the total land area...

, Middle-East and Iraq
Iraq
Iraq ; officially the Republic of Iraq is a country in Western Asia spanning most of the northwestern end of the Zagros mountain range, the eastern part of the Syrian Desert and the northern part of the Arabian Desert....

. Assistant professor at the Institut d'études politiques de Paris
Institut d'Etudes Politiques de Paris
The Institut d'études politiques de Paris , simply referred to as Sciences Po , is a public research and higher education institution in Paris, France, specialised in the social sciences. It has the status of grand établissement, which allows its admissions process to be highly selective...

, president of the Prize Joseph Kessel
Joseph Kessel
Joseph Kessel was a French journalist and novelist.He was born in Villa Clara, Entre Ríos, Argentina, because of the constant journeys of his father, a Lithuanian doctor of Jewish origin. Joseph Kessel lived the first years of his childhood in Orenburg, Russia, before the family moved to France...

, he is today ambassador
Ambassador
An ambassador is the highest ranking diplomat who represents a nation and is usually accredited to a foreign sovereign or government, or to an international organization....

 of France at large. His novels, travels writing books and essays have been translated in a dozen of languages.

Biography

Olivier Weber, born in 1958 in Montluçon, France
France
The French Republic , The French Republic , The French Republic , (commonly known as France , is a unitary semi-presidential republic in Western Europe with several overseas territories and islands located on other continents and in the Indian, Pacific, and Atlantic oceans. Metropolitan France...

, is a writer
Writer
A writer is a person who produces literature, such as novels, short stories, plays, screenplays, poetry, or other literary art. Skilled writers are able to use language to portray ideas and images....

, novelist and reporter at large. He has studied economics and anthropology at the University of San Francisco, University of Paris Sorbonne, University of Nice (Ph.D.) and at the National Institute of Oriental Languages and Civilizations (Institut National des Langues et Civilisations Orientales, INALCO). He won the Albert Londres
Albert Londres
Albert Londres was a French journalist and writer. One of the inventors of investigative journalism, he criticized abuses of colonialism such as forced labour. Albert Londres gave his name to a journalism prize for Francophone journalists.- Biography :Londres was born in Vichy in 1884...

 Prize and Joseph Kessel
Joseph Kessel
Joseph Kessel was a French journalist and novelist.He was born in Villa Clara, Entre Ríos, Argentina, because of the constant journeys of his father, a Lithuanian doctor of Jewish origin. Joseph Kessel lived the first years of his childhood in Orenburg, Russia, before the family moved to France...

 Prize for his reports on wars and books.

The guerilla years

Assistant professor at the Institut d'études politiques de Paris
Institut d'Etudes Politiques de Paris
The Institut d'études politiques de Paris , simply referred to as Sciences Po , is a public research and higher education institution in Paris, France, specialised in the social sciences. It has the status of grand établissement, which allows its admissions process to be highly selective...

 (Sciences-Po), he began his career of journalist in California
California
California is a state located on the West Coast of the United States. It is by far the most populous U.S. state, and the third-largest by land area...

. Then he was sent in Africa
Africa
Africa is the world's second largest and second most populous continent, after Asia. At about 30.2 million km² including adjacent islands, it covers 6% of the Earth's total surface area and 20.4% of the total land area...

 for the french daily Liberation, to cover several wars and conflicts. He joined the french weekly Le Point
Le Point
Le Point is a French weekly news magazine. It was founded in 1972 by a group of journalists who had, one year earlier, left the editorial team of L'Express, which was then owned by Jean-Jacques Servan-Schreiber, a député of the Parti Radical...

 as a journalist and later was appointed foreign correspondent. As a war correspondent
War correspondent
A war correspondent is a journalist who covers stories firsthand from a war zone. In the 19th century they were also called Special Correspondents.-Methods:...

, he has traveled with a dozen of guerillas and armed movements. He has covered around twenty wars and conflicts, including wars and armed conflicts in Afghanistan
Afghanistan
Afghanistan , officially the Islamic Republic of Afghanistan, is a landlocked country located in the centre of Asia, forming South Asia, Central Asia and the Middle East. With a population of about 29 million, it has an area of , making it the 42nd most populous and 41st largest nation in the world...

, Iraq
Iraq
Iraq ; officially the Republic of Iraq is a country in Western Asia spanning most of the northwestern end of the Zagros mountain range, the eastern part of the Syrian Desert and the northern part of the Arabian Desert....

, Burma, Kurdistan, Chechnya
Chechnya
The Chechen Republic , commonly referred to as Chechnya , also spelled Chechnia or Chechenia, sometimes referred to as Ichkeria , is a federal subject of Russia . It is located in the southeastern part of Europe in the Northern Caucasus mountains. The capital of the republic is the city of Grozny...

, Israel
Israel
The State of Israel is a parliamentary republic located in the Middle East, along the eastern shore of the Mediterranean Sea...

, Palestinian Territories
Palestinian territories
The Palestinian territories comprise the West Bank and the Gaza Strip. Since the Palestinian Declaration of Independence in 1988, the region is today recognized by three-quarters of the world's countries as the State of Palestine or simply Palestine, although this status is not recognized by the...

, Chad
Chad
Chad , officially known as the Republic of Chad, is a landlocked country in Central Africa. It is bordered by Libya to the north, Sudan to the east, the Central African Republic to the south, Cameroon and Nigeria to the southwest, and Niger to the west...

, Pakistan
Pakistan
Pakistan , officially the Islamic Republic of Pakistan is a sovereign state in South Asia. It has a coastline along the Arabian Sea and the Gulf of Oman in the south and is bordered by Afghanistan and Iran in the west, India in the east and China in the far northeast. In the north, Tajikistan...

, Kashmir
Kashmir
Kashmir is the northwestern region of the Indian subcontinent. Until the mid-19th century, the term Kashmir geographically denoted only the valley between the Great Himalayas and the Pir Panjal mountain range...

, Algeria
Algeria
Algeria , officially the People's Democratic Republic of Algeria , also formally referred to as the Democratic and Popular Republic of Algeria, is a country in the Maghreb region of Northwest Africa with Algiers as its capital.In terms of land area, it is the largest country in Africa and the Arab...

, Iran
Iran
Iran , officially the Islamic Republic of Iran , is a country in Southern and Western Asia. The name "Iran" has been in use natively since the Sassanian era and came into use internationally in 1935, before which the country was known to the Western world as Persia...

, Armenia
Armenia
Armenia , officially the Republic of Armenia , is a landlocked mountainous country in the Caucasus region of Eurasia...

, Russia
Russia
Russia or , officially known as both Russia and the Russian Federation , is a country in northern Eurasia. It is a federal semi-presidential republic, comprising 83 federal subjects...

, Kosovo
Kosovo
Kosovo is a region in southeastern Europe. Part of the Ottoman Empire for more than five centuries, later the Autonomous Province of Kosovo and Metohija within Serbia...

, Sri Lanka
Sri Lanka
Sri Lanka, officially the Democratic Socialist Republic of Sri Lanka is a country off the southern coast of the Indian subcontinent. Known until 1972 as Ceylon , Sri Lanka is an island surrounded by the Indian Ocean, the Gulf of Mannar and the Palk Strait, and lies in the vicinity of India and the...

, Western Sahara
Western Sahara
Western Sahara is a disputed territory in North Africa, bordered by Morocco to the north, Algeria to the northeast, Mauritania to the east and south, and the Atlantic Ocean to the west. Its surface area amounts to . It is one of the most sparsely populated territories in the world, mainly...

, East Timor
East Timor
The Democratic Republic of Timor-Leste, commonly known as East Timor , is a state in Southeast Asia. It comprises the eastern half of the island of Timor, the nearby islands of Atauro and Jaco, and Oecusse, an exclave on the northwestern side of the island, within Indonesian West Timor...

, Erythrea.
He then continues its activities as a writer, whose style is sometimes compared to that of Conrad
Conrad
- Other uses :* Conrad Editora, Brazilian publisher* Conrad Hotels, global luxury brand of Hilton Hotels* Conrad * Conrad , German manufacturer of diecast toys and promotional models...

 and Cendrars. Since then, he travels the world, from United States
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...

 to China
China
Chinese civilization may refer to:* China for more general discussion of the country.* Chinese culture* Greater China, the transnational community of ethnic Chinese.* History of China* Sinosphere, the area historically affected by Chinese culture...

, from Africa
Africa
Africa is the world's second largest and second most populous continent, after Asia. At about 30.2 million km² including adjacent islands, it covers 6% of the Earth's total surface area and 20.4% of the total land area...

 to the East which became his passion.
He brought from these illegal trips and stays several stories, surveys and novels, including Dragon Hunters: Opiomistan trip, and The White Death on the world of drug dealers.

The committed writer

Committed writer, Olivier Weber has written a lot of lost causes and indigenous people. He has defended in particular the resistance of South Sudan and has denouced the slavery of sudanese children.
He participated at the operations of saving the boat people
Boat people
Boat people is a term that usually refers to refugees, illegal immigrants or asylum seekers who emigrate in numbers in boats that are sometimes old and crudely made...

, in the China Sea, with volunteers of the international NGO Doctors of the World (Médecins du Monde
Médecins du Monde
Médecins du Monde or Doctors of the World, is a non-governmental humanitarian aid organisation created in March 1980 by 15 French doctors, including Bernard Kouchner after he had left Médecins Sans Frontières , the aid society which he had co-founded earlier in 1971...

).
He has also defended the afghan mujahideen
Mujahideen
Mujahideen are Muslims who struggle in the path of God. The word is from the same Arabic triliteral as jihad .Mujahideen is also transliterated from Arabic as mujahedin, mujahedeen, mudžahedin, mudžahidin, mujahidīn, mujaheddīn and more.-Origin of the concept:The beginnings of Jihad are traced...

 during the war against soviet army and then against the pro-commuunist regime of Najibullah and had traveled several times with the rebels and Commander Massoud.
After criticizing the regime of talibans, he has been expelled from Afghanistan
Afghanistan
Afghanistan , officially the Islamic Republic of Afghanistan, is a landlocked country located in the centre of Asia, forming South Asia, Central Asia and the Middle East. With a population of about 29 million, it has an area of , making it the 42nd most populous and 41st largest nation in the world...

 by the militians of Mollah Umar.
His denunciation of human trafficking by the Tamil Tigers of Sri Lanka
Sri Lanka
Sri Lanka, officially the Democratic Socialist Republic of Sri Lanka is a country off the southern coast of the Indian subcontinent. Known until 1972 as Ceylon , Sri Lanka is an island surrounded by the Indian Ocean, the Gulf of Mannar and the Palk Strait, and lies in the vicinity of India and the...

 and disposal of their prisoners, after several trips to the bush, brought him new threats. The plane was to take it from Jaffna to Colombo was deliberately shot down by fighters of the armed movement.
Following an expedition with one of the Burmese guerrillas, he met secretly in Rangoon the opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi
Aung San Suu Kyi
Aung San Suu Kyi, AC is a Burmese opposition politician and the General Secretary of the National League for Democracy. In the 1990 general election, her National League for Democracy party won 59% of the national votes and 81% of the seats in Parliament. She had, however, already been detained...

.

In August 2001, he traveled to Central Asia to lauch a humanitarian mission in the Panjshir Valley
Panjshir Valley
The Panjshir Province is a valley in north-central Afghanistan, 150 km north of Kabul, near the Hindu Kush mountain range. Located in the Panjshir Province it is divided by the Panjshir River...

 and bring to Ahmed Shah Massoud proofs of his book The Afghan Hawk. A few days later, September 9, 2001, two days before the attacks of the World Trade Center, the Lion of Panjshir was assassinated by two terrorists of Al Qaeda. Olivier Weber will attend his funeral, when the Taliban launched a major offensive. His testimony and his denunciation of the Taliban regime and the rise of Al Qaeda in Afghanistan
Afghanistan
Afghanistan , officially the Islamic Republic of Afghanistan, is a landlocked country located in the centre of Asia, forming South Asia, Central Asia and the Middle East. With a population of about 29 million, it has an area of , making it the 42nd most populous and 41st largest nation in the world...

, Pakistan
Pakistan
Pakistan , officially the Islamic Republic of Pakistan is a sovereign state in South Asia. It has a coastline along the Arabian Sea and the Gulf of Oman in the south and is bordered by Afghanistan and Iran in the west, India in the east and China in the far northeast. In the north, Tajikistan...

 and Central Asia
Central Asia
Central Asia is a core region of the Asian continent from the Caspian Sea in the west, China in the east, Afghanistan in the south, and Russia in the north...

 have earned him death threats. He has published on Central Asia and the Silk Road
Silk Road
The Silk Road or Silk Route refers to a historical network of interlinking trade routes across the Afro-Eurasian landmass that connected East, South, and Western Asia with the Mediterranean and European world, as well as parts of North and East Africa...

 several books: The Great Feast of the East, The Afghan Hawk: a journey to the land of the Taliban, Memory murdered, Road of drugs, The White Death .

He has also denounced the impunity of the Khmer Rouge
Khmer Rouge
The Khmer Rouge literally translated as Red Cambodians was the name given to the followers of the Communist Party of Kampuchea, who were the ruling party in Cambodia from 1975 to 1979, led by Pol Pot, Nuon Chea, Ieng Sary, Son Sen and Khieu Samphan...

 in the mountains of western Cambodia
Cambodia
Cambodia , officially known as the Kingdom of Cambodia, is a country located in the southern portion of the Indochina Peninsula in Southeast Asia...

, after meeting in the underground movement leaders Ieng Sary
Ieng Sary
Ieng Sary was a powerful figure in the Khmer Rouge. He was the Deputy Prime Minister and Foreign Minister of Democratic Kampuchea from 1975 to 1979 and held several senior positions in the Khmer Rouge until his defection to the government in 1996....

 and Khieu Samphan
Khieu Samphan
Khieu Samphan was the president of the state presidium of Democratic Kampuchea from 1976 until 1979. As such, he served as Cambodia's head of state and was one of the most powerful officials in the Khmer Rouge movement, though Pol Pot was the group's true political leader and held the most...

, both former deputies of Pol Pot
Pol Pot
Saloth Sar , better known as Pol Pot, , was a Cambodian Maoist revolutionary who led the Khmer Rouge from 1963 until his death in 1998. From 1976 to 1979, he served as the Prime Minister of Democratic Kampuchea....

.

In May 2009, he gives the award Joseph Kessel Prize to the writer and member of the French Academy Erik Orsenna for his fight for water and his latest book.

The film of his book Cursed for Gold (J'aurais de l'or), travelogue on human trafficking in the Amazon and other traffickings related to deforestation and the massacre of Native Americans, was the subject of a remarkable press and has been described as a witness in the vein of Darwin's Nightmare and Blood diamond,..

His essay on Joseph Kessel
Joseph Kessel
Joseph Kessel was a French journalist and novelist.He was born in Villa Clara, Entre Ríos, Argentina, because of the constant journeys of his father, a Lithuanian doctor of Jewish origin. Joseph Kessel lived the first years of his childhood in Orenburg, Russia, before the family moved to France...

, Kessel, The Eternal nomad, highlights the commitment of the reporter and member of the French Academy.

He is a member of the Albert Londres Award's jury.
Author and writer of documentaries, he is also editor of the series "Writers travelers."

The ambassador

Olivier Weber has been nominated in 2008 ambassador
Ambassador
An ambassador is the highest ranking diplomat who represents a nation and is usually accredited to a foreign sovereign or government, or to an international organization....

 of France at large, in charge of human trafficking and human rights. He has done several dozens of missions for this task in Asia, Africa, Central America, Middle East, and advocates at the tribune of the United Nations
United Nations
The United Nations is an international organization whose stated aims are facilitating cooperation in international law, international security, economic development, social progress, human rights, and achievement of world peace...

 mainly on human trafficking, child soldiers, fight against drugs, civil society and human rights.
He has received several awards and prizes of literature and journalism, among them the prestigious Albert Londres Prize
Albert Londres Prize
The Albert Londres Prize is a French journalism award, named in honor of journalist Albert Londres. Created in 1932, it was first awarded in 1933, and has been awarded every year since to the "best reporter in the written press"...

, considered as the french Pulitzer
Pulitzer
Pulitzer may refer to:* Pulitzer Prize, an annual U.S. journalism, literary, and music award* Pulitzer, Inc., a U.S. newspaper chain* Pulitzer Center on Crisis Reporting, a non-profit organization for journalists- People :...

 prize, for his articles and reports.
He is a selection committee member for literature awards and member of the Société des Explorateurs Français (Society of the French Explorers).

Literature and Journalism Prizes and Awards

  • Prize Lazareff 1991
  • Prix Albert Londres 1992
  • Special Prize of War correspondents 1997
  • Second Prize of War correspondents 1997
  • Prize Joseph Kessel
    Joseph Kessel
    Joseph Kessel was a French journalist and novelist.He was born in Villa Clara, Entre Ríos, Argentina, because of the constant journeys of his father, a Lithuanian doctor of Jewish origin. Joseph Kessel lived the first years of his childhood in Orenburg, Russia, before the family moved to France...

     1998
  • Prize Mumm 1999
  • Prize of Adventure 1999
  • Graduate of the Foundation Journalist Tomorrow
  • Prize of the FIPA
    FIPA
    The Foundation for Intelligent Physical Agents is a body for developing and setting computer software standards for heterogeneous and interacting agents and agent-based systems....

     (International Festival of Audiovisual Programmes) 2001
  • Laureate of Audiovisual 2001
  • Prize Louis Pauwels 2002
  • Special Prize of the International Festival of News Reporting (Festival international de grand reportage d'actualités) 2003
  • Prize of the Public of the International Festival of News Reporting (Festival international de grand reportage d'actualités) 2003
  • Prize Cabourg 2004
  • Prize of the Academy of Vichy 2005
  • Laureate of the fellowship "Writers Stendhal", 2001 and 2005
  • Trophy of the Adventure for the film Cursed for Gold (La Fièvre de l'or), adapted from his book I will have gold (J'aurai de l'or) on Amazonia, 2008
  • Chevalier de la Légion d'honneur en 2009
  • Prize Terra Festival 2010
  • Prize Amerigo Vespucci
    Amerigo Vespucci
    Amerigo Vespucci was an Italian explorer, financier, navigator and cartographer. The Americas are generally believed to have derived their name from the feminized Latin version of his first name.-Expeditions:...

     2011

Novels, essays and travel writing books

  • The Barbary Corsair (Le Barbaresque), (Flammarion, 2011)
  • Conrad, the Traveller of concern (Arthaud-Flammarion, 2011)
  • I will have gold (J'aurai de l'or) (Robert Laffont, 2008)
  • Is Tibet a lost cause? (Le Tibet est-il une cause perdue?), (Larousse, 2008)
  • The White Death (La mort blanche) (Albin Michel, 2007)
  • On the Silk Roads (Sur les routes de la soie) (avec Reza
    Reza
    Reza is a male given name used commonly in the Muslim world, it comes from Arabic and it means contentment. It also appears as a surname.-Etymology:Rida is an Islamic concept rooted in the Qur'an and the practices of its founder Muhammad...

    , (Hoëbeke, 2007)
  • Kessel, the eternal nomad (Kessel, le nomade éternel) (Arthaud, 2006)
  • The Angels battle (La Bataille des anges) (Albin Michel, 2006)
  • The Big Feast of the East (Le grand festin de l’Orient) (Robert Laffont, 2004)
  • Memory murdered (La Mémoire assassinée) (Mille et une nuits, 2004)
  • I am from nowhere: on the tracks of Ella Maillart (Je suis de nulle part : sur les traces d’Ella Maillart), (Éditions Payot, 2003)
  • Humanitaires (Le Félin, 2002)
  • La mémoire assassinée (Mille et Une Nuits, 2001)
  • Le faucon afghan : un voyage au pays des talibans (Robert Laffont, 2001)
  • On ne se tue pas pour une femme (Plon, 2000)
  • Dragon Hunters: a stay in Opiumistan (Chasseurs de dragons : voyage en Opiomie) (Payot), 2000)
  • The Slave children (Les Enfants esclaves) (Mille et une nuits, 1999)
  • Lucien Bodard, un aventurier dans le siècle (Plon, 1997)
  • Road of drugs (La route de la drogue) (Arléa, 1996)
  • French doctors : L’épopée des hommes et des femmes qui ont inventé la médecine humanitaire (Robert Laffont, 1995)
  • Voyage au pays de toutes les Russies (Éditions Quai Voltaire, 1992)

Filmography

Olivier Weber is the author, director and screenwriter of several films for television and theater, in particular on travels and on writers.
  • Documentary : Sudan: The Slave Children, France 2, 1998
  • Documentary : The Opium of talibans, french channels and theaters, 2001, Special Prize of FIPA
  • Documentary : Return to Cambodia, France 5, 2002[53],.
  • Documentary : On the road of Ganga, Arte, 2003, prize of the Public of Figra and Prize of Image of Figra.
  • Documentary : On the road of Nile, France 5, 2007.
  • Documentary : The People of Opium (Le Peuple de l'opium), Canal Plus, 2007.
  • Documentary : Cursed for Gold
    Cursed for Gold
    Cursed for Gold is a 2008 french documentary film written and directed by the french writer and novelist Olivier Weber, former war correspondent, dealing with the new gold rush destroying the rainforest of Amazonia....

     (La Fièvre de l'Or), Canal Plus and France 2, in french theaters in october 2008.

External links

The source of this article is wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.  The text of this article is licensed under the GFDL.
 
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