fred de sam lazaro: in downtown beijing on the 20th floor of a high-rise, one of china's senior environmental reporters is becoming a buddhist. [doorbell rings] liu jianqiang: hi. fred: hi. liu: fred? hi. fred: good to meet you. liu: nice to see you. fred: likewise. liu jianqiang is an investigative journalist. his first story about the environment was an exposÉ about illegal dam construction on the upper yangtze river. it made national headlines. his hard-hitting stories eventually got him fired, so he continued his work as the beijing editor of china dialogue, an online international journal. [liu speaking chinese] fred: but after 10 years of reporting, he was feeling burned out. [liu speaking chinese] translator: i think that our environmental activists and those who work for public welfare need more powerful spiritual support. why? every day what we do may be good deeds which give us positive energy, but meanwhile what we are facing is the darkest side of the world. every day what we see is polluted air, polluted rivers, and the slaughter of wild animals. this kind of negative energy atta

special correspondent fred de sam lazaro has the story of one man who has made it his mission to bringffordable hygiene products to women in india. this story originally aired last spring. >> reporter: arunachalam muruganantham was a born tinkerer, obsessed with figuring out how things worked-- from toys to bicycles. he grew up in poverty after his father died young. muruganantham dropped out of school and became a welder, a lower middle class occupation in india. >> to support my mother i quit my schooling. >> reporter: but his natural curiosity apparently knew no bounds. years later it took him into a strictly taboo area in india's tradition-bound society: menstrual hygiene. >> that is why we are able to break the taboo. >> reporter: he's become known as india's pad mad. your goal is to have every woman in this country use sanitary pads, if they need it? >> yes, i'm building a movement. it's a movement, yeah. >> reporter: a movement begun by a man who knew almost nothing about the female body until after he was married. you did not even know what menstruation was, is that correct? >>

fred de sam lazaro reports, part of our ongoing series, agents for change. >> she had an easy deliveryt night. >> reporter: it was a pretty typical day at the edna adan hospital. three babies had just been born; a half-dozen high-risk women were in labor. several others were being treated for life-threatening illnesses. at the center of it all: the hospital's founder and namesake: edna adan. >> these are the kind of women i built the hospital for. but a woman who is anemic. a woman who has had previous complications, a woman who has a scar, a woman who has lost babies before-- these are the >> reporter: what is especially remarkable is where this is all taking place in hargeisa, the capital of somaliland, an enclave that declared its independence three decades ago from the war-torn somalia but is not recognized by the rest of the world. the region suffers from some of the world's highest rates of infant and maternal mortality. adan was born here 79 years ago, the daughter of a prominent physician. at 17, she won a scholarship to study in england, becoming a midwife. she returned to som

special correspondent fred de sam lazaro reports, part of his series, "agents for change." >> reporter's not often you'll find a school in africa that provides meals to its students. >> we give them breakfast and lunch. >> reporter: you didn't get this when you went to school? >> no. >> reporter: it not only helps students focus on learning, but this simple plate of corn, or maize, and beans may also be the reason many show up at all. the school's 30-year-old founder remembers packed classrooms when he started primary school, but they didn't stay that way for long. >> over 150 children, but i remember, by the time i was in primary seven, we had about 15 children left. >> reporter: lots of children drop out? >> they drop out, and the problem is connected to food. >> reporter: joseph munyambanza was born in the democratic republic of congo, but his parents, like tens of thousands of others, fled to uganda when he was six. for decades, uganda has welcomed refugees from its war-torn neighbors, but even with united nations' help, its resources are very limited. rwanda? congo? last year, i v

for the pbs newshour, this is fred de sam lazaro in new delhi. >> woodruff: now, we kick off a week ofks with a unique take on the conflicting loyalties and violence that define one of the most dangerous parts of today's middle east. jeffrey brown has this new addition to the newshour bookshelf. >> brown: the setting is the border zone between turkey and syria, the upheavals and horrors of the syrian civil war as they play out for a group of individuals. the stuff of today's headlines given fictional life in the new novel, dark at the crossing. author elliot ackerman lives in istanbul and has reported from this area. he's a former marine who served in iraq and in afghanistan, the setting of his first novel, "green on blue." and welcome to you. >> thanks for having me. >> brown: i mentioned that this is an area that you've come to know but where does the idea for a novel come in and which came first, the novel or getting to know this world? >> i think something i'm interested in my writing is often political themes. but when we look at a lot of these political issues, whether it's what'