Mark Mardell in hostile environments

Mark Mardell heads into hostile territory for the BBC, but this is just make believe. The BBC’s Europe Editor found it increasingly daft that he was missing out on stories because he hadn’t done the requisite hostile environment training course,

Why am I here if I don’t want to get close to gunfire? Well, I am not and never will be a frontline war correspondent, but it was getting increasingly stupid not knowing this stuff.. Just before the summer I was all ready to go on a trip to see the EU mission in Chad and was stopped from going because I hadn’t done the course. Then there’s the little matter of the first European war of the 21st Century, awaiting EU observers. And even the most timid journalist is someone
who runs the wrong way: towards trouble, rather than away from it. link

Here’s the Reuters take on a similar course. Some British journalism students also went through the mill and then there are the Romanians.