In a gripping excerpt, NBC News chief foreign correspondent Richard Engel writes in Vanity Fair about his kidnapping in Syria last year.

Engel wrote the article in a diary format, recounting to the minute what happened. Subscribers can read the full account, but the excerpt focuses on the kidnapping itself, as well as the murder of one of their bodyguards, and the psychological torture that ensued:

“Get going!” a gunman yelled at me in Arabic, pointing his weapon at my chest.

I looked at him blankly, pretending not to understand. Foreigners who speak Arabic in the Middle East are often assumed to be working for the C.I.A. or Israel’s intelligence agency, the Mossad. The gunman took me by the finger, holding on to it by the very tip. I could have pulled it away with the smallest tug.

But then what? Then go where?

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North Korea. The Harlem Globetrotters. Ex-NBA star Dennis Rodman. Kim Jong Un.

It was a gonzo journalism stunt at its finest, and it was chronicled by VICE for its upcoming TV newsmagazine on HBO. The New York Times‘ Brian Stelter gives the tick-tock on how the trip went down. Some kety details: HBO paid a little extra to VICE, beyond the agreed upon licensing fees, to help pay for the trip. Rodman and the Harlem Globetrotters were paid an undisclosed sum to go on the trip, and it isn’t yet cl;ear when the North Korea trip will air on the series, which debuts April 5.

To say this was all part of Vice’s master plan would overstate the matter. The producers and reporters had no assurances that Mr. Kim would attend the game. But when they arranged the trip to North Korea, a rarity in and of itself, they thought like diplomats. To get what they wanted, they considered what they could give — and they came up with Mr. Rodman and the Globetrotters. “We knew he’d be tempted by basketball,” said a Vice spokesman, referring to Mr. Kim…

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Credit: Lorenzo Bevilaqua/ABC Television

ABC’s “This Week” scored a surprise interview with former NBA star Dennis Rodman and Shane Smith, the co-founder of VICE. Rodman just returned from North Korea, where he watched the Harlem Globetrotters play basketball, and partied with North Korean dictator Kim Jong Un.

Rodman and the VICE crew were the first Americans to meet with the North Korean leader since he assumed power. He is known to be a big basketball fan.

“He wants Obama to do one thing: Call him,” Rodman told George Stephanopoulos. “He said, ‘If you can, Dennis – I don’t want [to] do war. I don’t want to do war.’ He said that to me.”

Rodman called Kim Jong Un ‘my friend,” drawing pushback from Stephanopoulos, and ended the interview by saying “don’t hate me.”

Rodman’s trip was documented by VICE for its upcoming HBO newsmagzine. Video of his “This Week” appearance is here.

NBC News is planning a series of reports about Pakistan, specifically North Waziristan, the place where the Taliban is believed to be based, and where the U.S. launches more drone strikes than anywhere else. “Inside Pakistan” will kick off Monday March 4 on “Today,” with more installments on other NBC News programs and outlets throughout the week.

Correspondent and Islamabad bureau chief Amna Nawaz traveled to Waziristan for the series, the first foreign journalist granted permission by Pakistan’s government to do so. Some of her reports apparently focus on the Pakistani military’s efforts to build roads and schools in the isolated region.

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CNN International correspondent Reza Sayah was in Iran this week, reporting on the wrestling World Cup, taking place in Tehran.

Iran dominated its match-up with the U.S., but the real drama happened in the press room. Iranian security guards confiscated footage from CNN, and erased a handful of interviews conducted during the tourney.

“It was a rare, golden opportunity to show how sports can bring countries together,” Sayah said, noting that someone sent a text message to security saying that CNN was dragging politics into the tournament by asking about U.S./Iran relations. “After they erased the interviews, they said that we can do the same interviews again. We made sure that no one made us compromise our report editorially.”

WATCH:

NBC News foreign correspondent Michelle Kosinski is a veteran of covering stories abroad. From the London Riots to the Arab Spring, she is always prepared for whatever comes her way.

Now on day 12 of her coverage of the Oscar Pistorious murder trial, Kosinski writes on the “Today” blog with some grizzly behind the scenes details… with regard to her pants. It seems that she only has one pair, and they have been getting plenty of use.

I was able to somehow persuade a hair salon over the phone to deliver my favorite shampoo and conditioner to my hotel, which was a nice comfort when I inevitably started to run out of products as well, but there would be no doing that with clothing.

Thus, my 11-day trouser run. The longest ever. Thank goodness.

As she notes, when you are on-camera, it doesn’t particularly matter what you are wearing below the waist.

CBS News correspondent Bob Simon has been covering the Israeli-Palestinian conflict since the early 1970s. In a segment for 60MinutesOvertime.com, CBS News profiles Simon and his storied career a a foreign correspondent, in Israel and beyond.

Although Simon’s reporting has not always portrayed Israel in the best light, he remains a household name in Israel, where he is known by his first name, “bub” as they call him. he also has some of the best sources in the Israeli government.

When he was captured by the Iraqi military during the first gulf war, CBS put together an obituary for Simon, and gave it to him when he returned.

Once again, China has blocked CNN International’s live feed within the country, as the network reports on a story that paints the government there in a bad light. This afternoon CNNI Hala Gorani conducted an interview about the revelation that the New York Times was hacked by Chinese hackers over a period of months.

The entire six-minute segment was blocked in the country, as CNNI’s feed went dark:

CNNI went dark for 6 minutes RT @ragreenecnn: Breaking: #China blacks out CNN for @halagorani interview on hacking of @nytimes

— Hala Gorani (@HalaGorani) January 31, 2013

Last year China censored a segment on Anderson Cooper‘s program about blind activist Chen Guanchcheng.

In their interview with “Rock Center” last night, NBC News chief foreign correspondent Richard Engel, along with his production team, said that they believed they would die in Syria.

Engel, cameraman John Kooistra , producers Ghazi Balkiz, Aziz Akyavas and Ammar Cheikh Omar arrived in the U.S. late yesterday, and Savannah Guthrie conducted the interview not long after they landed.

Guthrie asked them to raise their hands if they thought that “this is it,” that they would die in Syria. Every man raised their hand.

“There was no doubt that these were violent people and that they could have executed us at any stage,” Engel said.

WATCH:

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ABC’s Christiane Amanpour hit the road recently for a new ABC News special called “Back to the Beginning”. MediabistroTV sat down with Amanpour last week for an upcoming episode of “My First Big Break.” In this video, Amanpour explains what to expect in her new special, which airs in two parts beginning tomorrow night and continuing next Friday on ABC.