Remote patrol

Do we need to see yet another grisly documentary about the brutality that conquering armies are capable of meting out to the conquered? In the case of "Cry Freetown," airing at 9 tonight on CNN's "NewsStand," the answer is yes. In the tiny West African nation of Sierra Leone, Sorious Samura watched last year as rebel forces stormed the capital city of Freetown and killed or mutilated thousands of citizens. Samura, a native of Sierra Leone, went out and began filming the carnage. What's interesting is that as graphic as the images are, I felt myself riveted even more by the thought that Samura was out there with his camera, putting himself directly in harm's way. The preferred torture of the rebels is hacking off the limbs of their countrymen; what's the life of a journalist next to that? Samura explains why he did it: "This was about a nation in dire need a nation being left to die by the Western world, the so-called developed world. No one came to our aid."