Been In the Wars

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Owen Bennett Jones introduces analysis and reflection from reporters and writers around the world. In this edition: it's war - but perhaps not always along predictable lines. Richard Galpin explores the huge challenges facing Iraq's Special Forces as they try to retake the city of Mosul from so-called Islamic State - and the risks this assault might hold for communal unity in future. Linda Pressly rides - at her own risk - with Albania's drug policemen, who now have to try and uproot a booming new trade in cannabis. Damian Quinn returns to Aleppo, six years after his first visit, to find a ruined and divided city which the Assad government is still fighting hard to control. Abidjan, too, was once a warzone as Ivory Coast was mired in political crises in past decades - occasionally teetering on the brink of complete anarchy. But James Copnall, the BBC's correspondent there a decade ago, went back to find a country and a city now eager to get back to business. PHOTO: A member of the Iraqi Special Forces behind the reinforced windshield of an armoured vehicle, bearing the bullet marks, in a district of Northeastern Mosul on November 24, 2016. (THOMAS COEX/AFP/Getty Images)