Doualy Xaykaothao
Doualy Xaykaothao is a newscaster and reporter for NPR, based in Culver City. She returned to NPR for this role in 2018, and is responsible for writing, producing, and delivering national newscasts. She also reports on breaking news stories for NPR.
Before she came to NPR, Xaykaothao was a correspondent at Minnesota Public Radio, where she covered race, culture, and immigration. She also served as a senior reporter at KERA, NPR's Member station in Dallas and was an Annenberg Fellow at Member station KPCC in Pasadena.
Xaykaothao first joined NPR in 1999 as a production assistant for Morning Edition, and has since worked as a producer, editor, director, and reporter for NPR's award-winning newsmagazines. For many years, Xaykaothao was also based in Seoul and Bangkok, chasing breaking news in North and Southeast Asia for NPR. In Thailand, she covered the 2004 Indian Ocean earthquake and tsunami. In South Korea, she reported on rising tensions between the two Koreas, including Pyongyang's attack on the South Korean island of Yeonpyeong. In Nepal, as a 2006 International Reporting Project Fellow, she reported on the effects of war on children and women. In 2011, she was the first NPR reporter to reach northern Japan to cover the Tōhoku earthquake and the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear meltdowns.
Xaykaothao is a multi-platform journalist whose work has won Edward R. Murrow and Peabody Awards. She is a member of the ethnic Hmong hill tribe, born in Laos, but raised in France and the United States. She attended college in upstate New York, where she specialized in ethnic studies, television, radio, and political science.
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President Obama is visiting South Korea for a nuclear security summit just three months after new leader has come to power in North Korea. All parties are looking to see if the atmosphere is changing, but for now, tensions are still running high along the armistice line. -
Japan's Miyage prefecture was one of the hardest hit by last year's earthquake and tsunami. There, the coastal community of Yuriage remains practically deserted. What was once a beautiful harbor filled with boats and a bustling community is now a desolate and deserted place, Doualy Xaykaothao reports.
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A year after the earthquake and tsunami that killed almost 20,000 people in northeast Japan, schoolchildren are moving on, but have not forgotten. The students and their teachers talk about the effect the quake and its aftermath has had on them. -
Radiation still leaks from the Fukushima Dai-ichi nuclear plant in northeast Japan after last year's meltdowns. The continuing threats from the disaster go beyond contamination: For farmers, uncertainty can also be toxic. -
The Kaesong Industrial Complex is a joint North Korea and South Korea experiment. Every day hundreds of workers from South Korea go to work in North Korea, and thousands of workers from North Korea go to jobs in South Korean factories at the complex. The atmosphere was heavy after North Korean leader Kim Jong Il died.
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The U.S. military is investigating claims by veterans that they buried barrels of the toxic defoliant at an American base in South Korea three decades ago. Agent Orange was used during the Vietnam War, and it's been blamed for a variety of ailments, including cancer and nerve disorders.
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Gen. Vang Pao, an exiled leader from the Hmong hill tribe in communist Laos, was a CIA ally during the Vietnam War. Now, shortly after his death and six-day funeral in California, NPR's Doualy Xaykaothao — Vang Pao's grandniece — is delving into her family history. Who was Vang Pao, and what stories can his surviving sisters share? -
In Japan's Miyagi prefecture, construction crews will soon begin putting up pre-fabricated homes for tens of thousands of people displaced by this month's tsunami and earthquake. Almost 250,000 thousand people are living in emergency shelters. Many of them will be able to move into the new units by next month.
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Radiation at Japan's troubled nuclear plants is causing new concerns on Sunday. Authorities report that radiation levels in the contaminated water at reactor unit 2 are four times higher than is safe. They have evacuated workers from there. Meanwhile along many coastal communities survivors are struggling with hardship and loss.
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Even those who live and work a good distance away from the badly damaged Fukishima Dai-ichi plant are still concerned about the threat of exposure to radiation. Members of the Holland family have a home and business in Aizuwakamatsu, a small country town in northern Japan.
