The Villadom Times Weekly Newspaper Online-Sept 1, 2010 Issue

Wyckoff September 1, 2010 THE VILLADOM TIMES I • Page 11 David Rohde, the New York Times reporter who escaped from the Taliban after seven months in captivity in Pakistan, will speak at the Wyckoff Family YMCA, 691 Wyckoff Avenue in Wyckoff at 7:30 p.m. on Wednesday, Sept. 29. The event is being cosponsored by the Wyckoff Y and the North Jersey Chapter of the American Red Cross. It will be held in the Carl Pfeifer Performing Arts Center. Admission is free. Reporter to discuss escape from Taliban Rohde, a two-time Pulitzer Prize winner, and two Afghan colleagues were kidnapped by members of the Taliban on Nov. 10, 2008 outside Kabul. Rohde, who was researching a book on the Afghan war, had been invited to an interview by a Taliban commander. When Rohde, an Afghan journalist and their Afghan driver arrived for the interview, they were abducted by the Taliban commander and taken to the tribal areas of Pakistan. Despite several days of rain last week, the Wyckoff Department of Public Works made time to get the township’s roads ready for the upcoming school year. DPW employees re-striped road safety markings and replaced regulatory signs. The public works crews have spent the last two weeks re-striping and re-painting road safety markings such as stop lines, school crosswalks, school crossing legends, center lines, and edge of road lines to make motoring safe at night and in rainy weather. The public works staff also inspects advance school crosswalk and school crosswalk signs and other regulatory signs, and replaces or installs additional signs where needed. Police Chief Ben Fox reminds residents that motorists are required to stop for pedestrians, and that pedestrians in the crosswalks have the right of way. “Be aware that New Jersey Motor Vehicle Laws require that the driver of a vehicle must stop for a pedestrian crossing the roadway,” Chief Fox said last week. Fox added a few other reminders: DPW gets roads ready for student safety Observe the 25 mile per hour vehicle speed limit in school zones. Be aware that all roads in the Township of Wyckoff have a 25 mile per hour speed limit unless otherwise posted. Observe traffic laws regarding school buses. Never drive past a school bus that is flashing its lights or is displaying a stop sign. Motorists should always obey the instructions of school crossing guards. Motorists should always be alert and drive carefully around the township, especially during the hours when children are going to and from school and crossing guards are in the roadway. “School crossing guards are dedicated individuals who are on their posts through all weather conditions ensuring the safety of our children who walk or bike to school,” Chief Fox added. “With the cooperation of drivers on our roadways and the safety provided by our school crossing guards, the Wyckoff Police Department works together to make our community as safe as possible for our school children.” Rohde and the Afghan journalist escaped from captivity in June 2009. Five weeks later, their Afghan driver also returned home. Rohde’s five part series about his imprisonment won the prestigious George Polk Award for international reporting and he was a finalist for the 2010 Pulitzer Prize in international reporting. During his time as a prisoner, Rohde saw that the Taliban regime the United States thought it had toppled in 2001 had shifted a few miles to the east and was alive and thriving in Pakistan’s tribal areas. While receiving over $1 billion a year in aid from the United States, Pakistan’s powerful military reportedly turned a blind eye to the Taliban’s activities. With the assistance of the International Committee of the Red Cross, Rohde was able to exchange letters with his wife. The ICRC also facilitated the delivery of letters from the families of Rohde’s two Afghan colleagues. To help assure his safety, the Times asked other news organizations to not report about his captivity, while Rohde’s wife and family asked Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and Special Representative for Afghanistan and Pakistan Richard Holbrooke work to gain his release. While a reporter for the Christian Science Monitor, Rohde won the 1996 Pulitzer Prize for international reporting for his coverage of the massacre of 8,000 men and boys in Bosnia. From 2002 to 2005, Rohde was cochief of the Times’ South Asia Bureau and based in New Delhi. He shared a second Pulitzer with a team of reporters from the Times’ for their 2008 coverage of the war in Afghanistan and Pakistan. Rohde is a graduate of Brown University. He and his wife, Kristen Mulvihill, are co-authors of the forthcoming book “A Rope and a Prayer: A Kidnapping from Two Sides” �� BACK TO SCHOOL SPECIALS $5.00 OFF ANY SERVICE ANY SERVICE with purchase of $20 of service or more Can not be combined with any other offer. Exp. 9/30/10 $30.00 OFF Can not be combined with any other offer. 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