Rob Schmitz
Rob Schmitz is NPR's international correspondent based in Berlin, where he covers the human stories of a vast region reckoning with its past while it tries to guide the world toward a brighter future. From his base in the heart of Europe, Schmitz has covered Germany's levelheaded management of the COVID-19 pandemic, the rise of right-wing nationalist politics in Poland and creeping Chinese government influence inside the Czech Republic.
Prior to covering Europe, Schmitz provided award-winning coverage of China for a decade, reporting on the country's economic rise and increasing global influence. His reporting on China's impact beyond its borders took him to countries such as Kazakhstan, Mongolia, Vietnam, Thailand, Australia, and New Zealand. Inside China, he's interviewed elderly revolutionaries, young rappers, and live-streaming celebrity farmers who make up the diverse tapestry of one of the most fascinating countries on the planet. He is the author of the critically acclaimed book Street of Eternal Happiness: Big City Dreams Along a Shanghai Road (Crown/Random House 2016), a profile of individuals who live, work, and dream along a single street that runs through the heart of China's largest city. The book won several awards and has been translated into half a dozen languages. In 2018, China's government banned the Chinese version of the book after its fifth printing. The following year it was selected as a finalist for the Ryszard Kapuściński Award, Poland's most prestigious literary prize.
Schmitz has won numerous awards for his reporting on China, including two national Edward R. Murrow Awards and an Education Writers Association Award. His work was also a finalist for the Investigative Reporters and Editors Award. His reporting in Japan — from the hardest-hit areas near the failing Fukushima nuclear power plant following the earthquake and tsunami — was included in the publication 100 Great Stories, celebrating the centennial of Columbia University's Journalism School. In 2012, Schmitz exposed the fabrications in Mike Daisey's account of Apple's supply chain on This American Life. His report was featured in the show's "Retraction" episode. In 2011, New York's Rubin Museum of Art screened a documentary Schmitz shot in Tibetan regions of China about one of the last living Tibetans who had memorized "Gesar of Ling," an epic poem that tells of Tibet's ancient past.
From 2010 to 2016, Schmitz was the China correspondent for American Public Media's Marketplace. He's also worked as a reporter for NPR Member stations KQED, KPCC and MPR. Prior to his radio career, Schmitz lived and worked in China — first as a teacher for the Peace Corps in the 1990s, and later as a freelance print and video journalist. He also lived in Spain for two years. He speaks Mandarin and Spanish. He has a bachelor's degree in Spanish literature from the University of Minnesota, Duluth, and a master's degree from Columbia University's Graduate School of Journalism.
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The Austrian government is putting the entire country in lockdown starting Nov. 22 and is planning legislation to make vaccination compulsory for all Austrians in February.
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Austria is moving to put millions of unvaccinated citizens under lockdown as European countries take measures to try to control a new surge in COVID-19 infections.
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There's been sharp criticism by European leaders of attempts by the regime in Belarus to push migrants from the Middle East and elsewhere over its borders with European Union countries.
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Poland is sending more troops to its border with Belarus. Thousands of migrants are trying to cross the frontier there, apparently at the instigation of the Belarusian regime.
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Record numbers of COVID-19 deaths in Russia are being blamed on low vaccination rates. At the same time in Germany, which has a high vaccination rate, breakthrough infection rates are rising.
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Belarus is sending migrants across its border with Poland to pressure the EU, and when Poland illegally sends asylum-seekers back across the border, they face mistreatment by Belarussian police.
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It will likely take three parties to form a government. Two smaller parties — an environmentalist, progressive party and a libertarian party — appear to be banding together to call the shots. -
The center-left Social Democrats have won the biggest share of the vote in Germany's national election, beating outgoing Chancellor Angela Merkel's center-right Union bloc in a closely fought race.
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Although about a third of Germans vote by mail, millions of voters go to polling places today to choose a new government, and a successor to Angela Merkel, who is stepping down as Chancellor.
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As Germans prepare to vote in a general election, the country appears unsure about who would be the best sucessor to Angela Merkel, who is stepping down as chancellor after 16 years in power.
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Sunday's federal election will determine who will follow Merkel, who has served as Germany's chancellor for 16 years. The country's next government is expected to be a coalition of three parties. -
The election in Germany will make the end of an era — after 16 years as chancellor, Angela Merkel plans to step aside. The vote could also see her party out of power.
