Sean Carberry
Sean Carberry is NPR's international correspondent based in Kabul. His work can be heard on all of NPR's award-winning programs, including Morning Edition, All Things Considered, and Weekend Edition.
Prior to moving into his current role, he was responsible for producing for NPR's foreign correspondents in the Middle East and "fill-in" reporting. Carberry travels extensively across the Middle East to cover a range of stories such as the impact of electricity shortages on the economy in Afghanistan and the experiences of Syrian refugees in Turkish camps.
Carberry has reported from more than two-dozen countries including Iraq, Syria, Yemen, Lebanon, Egypt, Libya, Morocco, Afghanistan, Pakistan, Congo, Sudan, South Sudan, and Iceland. In 2010, Carberry won the Gabriel Award Certificate of Merit for America Abroad's "The First Freedom," and in 2011 was awarded the Sigma Delta Chi Award as lead producer and correspondent for America Abroad's series, "The Arab World's Demographic Dilemma."
Since joining NPR, Carberry worked with Lourdes Garcia-Navarro in Tripoli for NPR's coverage of the fall of the Libyan capital. He also covered the post-US withdrawal political crisis in Baghdad in December 2011, and recently completed a two month fill-in reporting assignment in Kabul that led to his current role.
Before coming to NPR in 2011, Carberry worked at America Abroad Media where he served as technical director and senior producer in addition to traveling internationally to report and produce radio and multimedia content for America Abroad's monthly radio news documentaries and website. He also worked at NPR Member Station WBUR in Boston as a field and political producer, associate producer/technical director, and reporter, contributing to NPR, newscasts, and WBUR's Here and Now.
In addition to his journalistic accolades, Carberry is a well-rounded individual who has also been an assistant professor of music production and engineering at Berklee College of Music in Boston, received a Gold Record as Recording Engineer for Susan Tedeschi's Grammy-Nominated album "Just Won't Burn," engineered music for the television program "Sex in the City," is a certified SCUBA diver, and is a graduate of the Skip Barber School of Auto Racing.
Carberry earned a Bachelor of Arts in Urban Studies from Lehigh University and a Masters of Public Administration from Harvard Kennedy School, with a focus in Politics, National Security, and International Affairs.
-
It's an expected sight in the Afghan capital: a hundred boys and girls — on foot, stilts and unicycles — juggling tennis balls and batons. The parade was part of the national juggling championship. Organizers hope juggling builds self-confidence in children who've known only war in their lifetimes. -
At peak deployment, 20,000 Marines were stationed in Helmand Province. Now there are only 8,000, and that number will drop further as Regimental Combat Team 7 heads home. Its commander says too many Afghans are dying in fighting there, but the local troops are still better than the Taliban. -
Afghanistan's top political comedy sketch show mocks aspects of day-to-day life in hopes of shaming the government to clean up its act. The cast of Zang-e-Khatar, or Danger Bell, has tackled everything from corruption to bad roads, and they've received death threats for doing it. -
Proposed peace talks with the Taliban seem to be on one minute, then off the next. Controversy erupted last week when the Taliban opened an office in Doha, Qatar, where talks are supposed to begin.
-
U.S. reconstruction teams have spent a decade building roads, bridges and other pieces of infrastructure that are badly needed in Afghanistan. But now the international effort is winding down, and it's not clear how much the Afghans will be able to do on their own. -
Afghanistan is set to issue new national IDs that will have a person's ethnicity embedded in it electronically — but not printed on it. That's renewed debate over a divisive issue in a country made up of many different groups. -
Tensions between Afghanistan and Pakistan are on the rise again following two border clashes in the space of a week. The trouble was apparently sparked by Pakistan's decision to erect a new border gate despite Afghan objections.
-
Afghans are expressing mixed feelings on CIA cash payments to President Hamid Karzai. Many say the practice is wrong and symbolizes the widespread corruption in the country, while some see it as just another form of foreign assistance. -
In Afghanistan this weekend, a suicide bomber took the lives of several Americans on a mission to deliver books to an Afghan school. Among the dead was 25-year-old Anne Smedinghoff. Coworkers say she was committed to improving the lives of Afghan women and children.
-
Relations between the two countries have long been problematic but seemed to be turning a corner a few months ago. Now, they are at it again: After a series of diplomatic miscues, each country is accusing the other of hindering peace talks with the Taliban.
