Release: Bureaux and Correspondents

10 October 2006 – Al Jazeera English, the new 24-hour English-language news and current affairs channel, headquartered in Doha, announced today its full line up of bureaux and correspondents around the world ahead of its global launch later this year.

 

In addition to four broadcast centres strategically placed around the world in Doha, Kuala Lumpur, London and Washington DC, Al Jazeera English will have around 20 supporting bureaux which will gather and produce news in the field, giving unprecedented access to a single network – this will be added to with further key bureaux over the coming months. The various bureaux around the world will feed local news on to the international stage through each broadcast centre, enabling Al Jazeera English language channel to seek out and cover different perspectives of news through grassroots reporting wherever news is made, and impartially present these stories to the English speaking world.  Through this structure (see more details below) Al Jazeera English will balance the typical information flow, for the first time ever on a global scale.

 

Al Jazeera English also announced that it has appointed a diverse team of talented and experienced correspondents from around the world who will report from the channel’s broadcast centres, bureaux and out in the field. (*Please see Editors Notes for biographies of correspondents).

 

Talking from the channel’s Doha headquarters, Managing Editor Omar Bec said,  “Together with the Arabic channel we will have more than 60 bureaux around the world with the majority of these in the Southern Hemisphere ensuring we will balance the information flow from South to North. We will be the channel of reference for the Middle East and Africa.”

 

Al Jazeera English will share the resources of Al Jazeera Arabic language Channel’s 42 bureaux located around the world and is already planning to add further key bureaux to the mix. These will be announced as they open.

 

“We will be adding several bureaux to our news gathering offering in the coming months. We’re looking at setting up further bureaux in South America, the horn of Africa, the Middle East and Africa,” he continued.

 

 

Al Jazeera is the channel of reference in the Middle East. Al Jazeera English will have unrivalled coverage and unique access – and through its sister channel a 10 year record of uncompromising and award winning journalism.

 

 
Correspondents: Hoda Abdel-Hamid, Hashem Ahelbarra, James Bays, John Cookson, Mike Hanna*

 
Bureaux: Beirut-Lebanon, Jerusalem-Israel, Ramallah and Gaza-Palestinian Territories

Correspondents: Zeina Khodr & Rula Amin, Jacky Rowland, Walid Batrawi*

 

 

Al Jazeera English will have more bureaux and resources dedicated to Africa than any other global broadcaster. Al Jazeera English will give a voice to the unheard by covering every aspect of life from this huge and ever changing continent.

 

Bureaux: Cairo-Egypt; Abidjan-Ivory Coast; Nairobi-Kenya; Johannesburg-South Africa and Harare-Zimbabwe

Correspondents: Amr El Kahky, Gabi Menezes, Haru Mutasa, Kalay Maistry, Farai Sevenzo*

 

 

Al Jazeera English also has a presence at the centre of the world’s largest population and fastest growing economies, with bureaux located across Asia, Australasia and Oceana. 

 

Broadcast Centre: Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia

 
Correspondents: Tony Birtley*

 
Bureaux: Beijing-China, Delhi-India, Islamabad-Pakistan, Manila-Philippines and Sydney- Australia

Correspondents: Tony Cheng, Zain Awan & Rajesh Sundaram, Kamal Hyder, Marga Ortigas, Dan Nolan*

 

 

Al Jazeera English’s news bureaux across the Americas will reveal the daily developments in political, social, economic and military agendas as they happen across the Caribbean, Latin America, South America, the USA and Canada.

 

 
Correspondents: Viviana Hurtado & Rob Reynolds*

 
Bureaux: Buenos Aires-Argentina, Caracas-Venezuela and New York-USA

Correspondents: Lucia Newman, Mariana Sanchez, Mark Seddon, Kristen Saloomey*

 

 

Al Jazeera English’s European broadcast centre is situated at the heart of Europe, reporting on activities from the European Union and strategically placed with its bureaux at the most Southern and most Northern gateways of Europe in Moscow and Athens.

 

 
Correspondents: Alan Fisher*

 
Bureaux: Athens-Greece and Moscow-Russia.

 
Correspondents: Barnaby Phillips, Jonah Hull*

 
NOTES TO EDITORS

 

 

Broadcast Centre- Doha, Qatar

 

Hoda Abdel-Hamid has special experience of many of the Middle East’s major recent news stories. With ABC News, Hoda covered Operation Desert Fox in December 1998; the lead-up to the invasion in 2003; and the immediate post-invasion situation. Since Operation Shock and Awe she has been on the ground regularly, covering the Falluja war, elections and referendums, and was embedded with Allied forces in Anbar and Tikrit. In addition to her work in Iraq, Hoda covered stories in Saudi Arabia, Yemen, Pakistan, India, Algeria, Morocco, Sudan, Nigeria, Libya, Egypt, Jordan, Syria, Lebanon, Tunisia and throughout the Middle East. Previously she covered the Balkan war from Bosnia and Croatia and also filed stories from Algeria, Egypt, Sudan, Gaza, Rwanda and from around Europe for France 3’s La Marche du Siecle programme. Hoda has gained various prestigious awards across her career including one at the Festival du film de Monaco and three Emmy Awards.

Hashem Ahelbarra joined Al Jazeera English from Abu Dhabi Television where he worked as a News Presenter and Senior Reporter since 2000, after roles with the London based ANN and the Moroccan channel 2M. Hashem has covered many of the biggest international news stories of recent years, including: the 2000 election of George W. Bush in the US and his re-election in 2004, the 2001 World Conference against Racism held in Durban South Africa,  the attacks of September 11th in Washington and New York,  the invasions of both Afghanistan and Iraq and the Asian Tsunami. He has also secured exclusive interviews with many of the major names in world news including Yasser Arafat, Hamed Karzai, Charles Taylor, Vaclav Havel,  General Richard Myers and General John Abi Zaid.

James Bays joined Al Jazeera English after working as a television correspondent for the UK’s ITN for over a decade. James has travelled to more than 70 counties and has reported from conflict zones, including Iraq, the Congo, Sierra Leone, Lebanon, Bosnia, Kosovo, Afghanistan, Panama, the former Soviet Union, Israel and the Palestinian territories. In 2003, he was in Baghdad throughout the Iraq war, where his reports were carried by NBC and CNN as well as ITN’s Five News. His interview with the Iraqi information minister the day before Baghdad fell formed the last ever official statement by Saddam’s regime. James has also worked as foreign correspondent for Independent Radio News, where he reported on the collapse of communism in Eastern Europe, the release of the Beirut hostages and the 1991 Gulf War.

 

John Cookson has extensive experience from roles with the UK’s BBC, IRN, TV-am, Sky News and the US’s Fox News. John has spent many years reporting from the Middle East and Gulf regions and covered major stories such as the Iran-Iraq war, the first Gulf War, the Iraq war of 2003 and the Palestinian Intifada. Between 2004 and 2005 he was part of the Fox News team, reporting and sub-anchoring from Baghdad. John was one of the original reporting team at Sky News and by the time he left in 1999 he had produced over 5,000 news packages from across 65 countries. After Sky News he formed his own production company producing documentaries and reports for Britain’s Channel 4 and Five networks. Before his work with Sky News, and following a position with ATV in Hong Kong, John became an on-screen reporter for Britain’s TV-am and filed major domestic and global stories for the well-known UK breakfast channel.

 

Mike Hanna is a journalist with more than twenty-five year’s experience of reporting from the world’s hot spots. Most recently Mike was CNN’s Jerusalem Bureau Chief, supervising and leading the network’s ongoing coverage of the dramatic events in the region. He also worked as CNN’s Senior International Correspondent based in Frankfurt and in 1993 opened CNN’s first Johannesburg Bureau. During this time he covered major stories throughout Africa, the Balkans, Russia and the Middle East.  He also reported extensively on developments in Northern Ireland.
Before joining CNN Mike worked for ITN’s Channel 4 News for ten years – during which time he was awarded four British Academy Awards as well as several Royal Television Society (RTS) Awards as part of the Channel 4 News team. He has also received a Cable ACE Award and a Bayeux War Correspondents award. He has been honoured by the New York Association of Black Journalists and in 1995 he won the prestigious Edward Weintal Prize for Diplomatic Reporting. Mike began his career as a Radio Journalist, working extensively for the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation, National Public Radio, the Australian Broadcasting Commission and IRN in the UK.

Bureaux

Beirut, Lebanon

Jacky Rowland is an internationally recognised television correspondent, with experience of covering conflicts in the Balkans and the Islamic world.  She joins Al Jazeera English from the BBC, where she held a number of high-profile foreign postings.  She is probably best-known for her coverage of the former Yugoslavia.  In October 2000, she defied an expulsion order by the Serbian authorities, went into hiding, and emerged in time to cover the overthrow of the former president, Slobodan Milosevic.  Her reporting earned her a Royal Television Society Award in 2001. Jacky joined the BBC as a trainee in 1989.  In the subsequent 16 years, her career as a foreign correspondent took her to North Africa, the Middle East, the Balkans, Russia, Afghanistan and the United States.

 

Walid Batrawi has built experience across television, radio and print media with organisations based in the Middle East and around the world. Most recently Walid was a correspondent for BBC Arabic Service Radio. On October 24, 2003 the European Commission and the International Federation of Journalists named Walid the winner of  IFJ’s 2003 Natali Prize for ‘Excellence in reporting Human Rights, Democracy and Development’ in the category of the Arab World, Iran and Israel. Walid has led many local and regional media training workshops and is a member of the International Press Institute (IPI), the Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ), the International federation of Journalist (IFJ), Investigative Reporters and Editors (IRE) and a board member of the Foreign Press Association (FPA).

Africa

 

Amr El-Kahky built his career in international news with Al Jazeera and the BBC. Amr has been covering all aspects of Egyptian life as Al Jazeera’s Cairo correspondent for the past two years. He has reported on major stories including the 2003 invasion of Iraq, where he was embedded with the American troops in the south of the country. Amr later returned to cover post-Saddam Iraq and covered the assassination of both Mohamad Baqer Al-Hakim and Aqila Al-Hashimi. In 2002 he covered the anniversary of the attacks on the World Trade Centre from Washington and New York. Before that, he covered Operation Anaconda in Afghanistan. Amr has produced a range of special coverage and reports for Al Jazeera, including an edition of Under The Microscope programme, entitled ‘Afghanistan after the Taliban’. Previously, Amr was a broadcast journalist, reporter and producer with the BBC’s radio and television Arabic services to which he moved from the Egyptian News Publishing Group ‘Akhbar El-Youm’

 

Abidjan, Ivory Coast

Gabrielle Menezes has worked across the international broadcast and print media in roles with the Cairo Times, Reuters and Abu Dhabi TV/Middle East Broadcasting. Missing the challenges of reporting as well as life in Africa, Gabrielle moved to Ivory Coast in 2005, where she became a freelance journalist covering the West Africa region and some of the most violent and long-running civil wars in the world. Prior to this role she was a producer for Reuters in London. Previously in New York she freelanced for Reuters’ New York bureau, and covered various events from entertainment to the UN, when discussions were underway regarding the 2003 invasion of Iraq. Gabrielle also worked for Abu Dhabi TV and Middle East Broadcasting in New York as a freelance producer from the UN.

 

Haru Mutasa’s career has encompassed roles with the South African Broadcasting Corporation (SABC), CNN, Television New Zealand (TVNZ), Associated Press Television News (APTN) and the Star Sports Network. As a reporter based out of Harare, Zimbabwe, Haru produced stories on Zimbabwe for CNN’s Inside Africa, Television New Zealand (TVNZ) and APTN. She worked across the country during its recent eventful past to give international viewers first-hand accounts of the latest developments on the ground. As a floor manager for SABC Africa during the March 2005 Zimbabwe parliamentary elections Haru managed and coordinated all the live studio broadcasts that aired on the elections from Zimbabwe.  As an election producer for the SABC in Johannesburg during South Africa’s April 2004 presidential elections she analysed election statistics and translated them into stories to keep viewers fully informed as the results unfolded.

 

Southern Africa correspondent Kalay Maistry has over 15 years of experience in journalism from roles with the South African Broadcasting Corporation (SABC), and with South Africa’s eTV, Radio 702, and Capital Radio. As senior political reporter with the SABC, Kalay covered major African stories such as the Schabir Shaik fraud and corruption trial, Zimbabwe’s Parliamentary Elections 2005, Parliamentary Elections – Botswana 2004, political reaction to South Africa’s winning bid to stage the 2010 World Cup, South Africa’s 2004 General Election, the official visit of German Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder and of IMF Managing Director Rodrigo de Rato and President Thabo Mbeki’s 2003 state visit to Malaysia. For eTV, South Africa’s first independent television station, Kalay reported on the Zimbabwean Presidential Election 2002, the World Summit on Sustainable Development and on local reaction to the attacks on the World Trade Centre in 2003, and to the subsequent invasions of Afghanistan and Iraq.

 

As both a writer and director for film, television and radio, Farai Sevenzo has switched between documentary and fiction in his coverage of major African issues. He graduated from England’s National Film and Television School and has made several short films on the African continent. Farai’s work in African current affairs has seen him report on wars in Sierra Leone, Liberia, the Congo and Northern Uganda. Over the last three years he has been a regular contributor to the UK’s Channel 4 News and to the same channel’s Unreported World programme. Farai has also contributed to the BBC’s African coverage – he presented the popular African magazine programme “Network Africa” on the World Service, and has made documentaries for BBC TWO and BBC FOUR.  As a documentary filmmaker, Farai recorded the ongoing events in Zimbabwe with a series of personal observations that began with the award-winning Zimbabwe 2002. In The Children’s War, he covered the Lords Resistance Army’s hold on northern Uganda. He has also worked in Africa as an independent filmmaker and radio producer.

Asia & Australasia

As a journalist for over 30 years, Asia correspondent Tony Birtley has worked with organisations ranging from news agencies to evening newspapers, radio in Hong Kong and in both regional and national television. Tony was TV-am’s Middle East correspondent for four years, filing reports and appearing on live two-ways for its news service and Frost on Sunday programme. He also worked for 5 years as a correspondent for ABC America and has reported for ITN, Channel 4, CNN, the BBC and Sky News. In 1994 Tony was awarded the RTS Reporter of the Year award for his stories from Bosnia and in 1993 he was badly wounded reporting from Srebrenica in Bosnia where he informed the world of what was happening to the besieged Muslims. Other conflicts Tony has covered include: the Lebanese civil war, the first Palestinian Intifada; the war between Iran and Iraq; the Gulf War of 1990 and the conflicts in Afghanistan, Chechnya, Sri Lanka, Somalia, Burma, Cambodia, Kosovo and Bosnia.

Bureaux

Beijing-China

Tony Cheng has specialist knowledge and experience of Asian affairs from his work with the BBC’s television, radio and online services. In 2003 Tony became a general correspondent in Thailand for BBC News covering events across East Asia. During that time he reported on the Asian tsunami, the insurgency in Southern Thailand and made in-depth features on China looking at the environmental impact of the country’s recent growth. Four years ago Tony moved to Thailand to become the BBC’s regional correspondent for the East Asia Today programme. He reported for the show from across East Asia and wrote for The Financial Times. Tony also worked in the region with the NGO ‘Internews’ on several projects to train Vietnamese, Khymer and Burmese journalists to report on HIV and Aids issues. After graduating from the School of Oriental and African Studies, London Tony worked in advertising and publishing before joining the BBC’s Chinese-language service. He then moved across into English-language news at the BBC World Service as a producer and later as a reporter.

 

Zain Awan built his career in roles with The Times of India, Sky News, NHK (Japan Broadcasting Corporation), APTN News and India’s iVision News. As NHK’s South Asia correspondent, he worked across six months of the channel’s extended coverage of Asian tsunami disaster and filed a collection of specials on the state of post-tsunami life in the Maldives. Previously Zain was based in New Delhi as an assistant producer with APTN and also contributed stories from across India to China Central Television, including the Chinese premiere’s historic 2005 visit, Kashmiri cross-border buses between Indian and Pakistan and President Musharraf’s famous ‘Cricket Diplomacy’. Before these roles he was at Sky News’s South Asia bureau. As a correspondent with iVision News, working out of New Delhi, Zain covered the India-Pakistan peace initiatives of 2003, which added to his extensive knowledge of Kashmiri affairs. In 2002 Zain took a step back from news journalism, moving to Madrid in 2002 to work with Oscar-award winning filmmaker, Pedro Almodovar on a docu-drama on relations between Islam and the West after the 2001 attacks on the World Trade centre.

 

Rajesh Sundaram has over 14 years of experience in national and international journalism. In his most recent role with New Delhi Television he handled major assignments including the London bombings from the UK. Previously he covered high-profile stories, including the 2001 attacks on the World Trade Centre from the United States for Zee News, India. Prior to this role he reported extensively on the South Asian Tsunami of 2004 from India and Sri Lanka for New Delhi Television. In addition to these events Rajesh has filed reports on all Indian elections over the last 10 years, the Palace Massacre in Kathmandu, Nepal and the ongoing civil wars and peace processes in Sri Lanka.

Islamabad, Pakistan

Kamal Hyder has unique experience of reporting from Afghanistan and Pakistan with CNN and AVT Khyber and for the international print and broadcast media. In his most recent role, Kamal anchored Pashto and English programming on AVT Khyber, covering all the tumultuous recent events in Afghan affairs. He combined this broadcasting work with his daily contributions to the Frontier Post English newspaper from Peshawar. Previously, as a CNN correspondent, Kamal reported from Afghanistan, covering events before and after the attacks on the World Trade Centre. During this time Kamal cemented his reputation as an Afghan specialist with his fast and exclusive access to high-profile news stories, including the destruction of the Bamian Buddhas and the American-led invasion. Kamal has regularly contributed to Time Magazine, the BBC, New York Times, the UK’s Sunday Times, MSNBC, ITN, Nippon TV, FNS Korea, Switzerland’s Facts magazine, Germany’s Stern magazine, Brazil’s TV GLOBO, the Toronto Star, and the UK’s Channel 4 News. Kamal is currently writing a book that draws on recent events and many of the personal experiences that have shaped his career, entitled The Last Days of the Taliban.

 

Manila, Philippines

Marga Ortigas’ career includes roles as an international news field producer, editor and reporter with CNN International and at ABS-CBN 2 News and GMA7 News in the Philippines. As a producer and occasional reporter with CNN International in London and Baghdad, Marga covered major stories including the invasion of Iraq and its aftermath; the killing in Gaza of Hamas leader Sheikh Yassin; the Afghanistan Peace talks in Germany; UK General Elections and the ousting of Former Filipino President Joseph Estrada. As a supervising producer with ABS-CBN 2 News in the Philippines she co-developed and launched the Asian network’s innovative weekend primetime newscast. Prior to this role she was an anchor, reporter and producer for GMA7 News’s English-language primetime newscast. With GMA7, Marga covered stories including the devastating Mount Pinatubo volcanic eruption in 1991; the departure of the US military from its bases in the Philippines; the first post-Marcos presidential elections and the Papal visit.

 

Dan Nolan joined Al Jazeera International as Australian correspondent from Channel 10 where he was a news correspondent based in Sydney, having also reported for the channel from Brisbane and Perth. Dan’s recent reporting highlights include covering the London terrorist bombings from the English capital in July 2005, traveling to Copenhagen in May 2004 to cover the royal wedding of Danish Crown Prince Frederik and Australian commoner Mary Donaldson and filing stories from Athens in the lead-up to the Olympics in 2004. Dan has also built experience covering news and sport, domestic and international political affairs as well as human interest stories from across Australia.

 

 

Viviana Hurtado has thorough knowledge of North and South America. Viviana joined the channel from Providence, Rhode Island, where she worked as an investigative reporter and anchor at the CBS and FOX affiliates. Prior to that, she was a correspondent and anchor with KRGV-TV in Brownsville, Texas, reporting on the US-Mexico border and general immigration issues, and investigating public corruption and waste. In addition to her television work, Viviana also worked as a freelance contributing reporter for the New York Times in Mexico City, covering the historic 2000 Mexican presidential elections. Viviana began her journalism career at CNN Espanol in Washington DC. Fluent in English and Spanish and proficient in three other languages, Viviana has a PhD in Spanish, Portuguese and African American studies from Yale University, a Masters in Latin American studies from Stanford University and a BA in Hispanic Literature and Languages and Latin American studies from University of California at Berkeley.

 

Rob Reynolds has over 25 years of experience in international television journalism from his work with CNN, NBC and CNBC. As CNBC’s Washington Correspondent, Rob reported from the White House, Capitol Hill, the Supreme Court and from overseas. He covered the 2004 Presidential election, US primary campaigns; party conventions and Presidential debates. In Autumn 2002, Rob produced and reported a 5-part series on the potential impact of war in Iraq on location in Egypt, Jordan, and Syria. Previously Rob was Moscow Correspondent for NBC News during the turbulent Yeltsin years and secured an exclusive American network interview with the new President prior to the 1998 Helsinki summit meeting with Bill Clinton. As a CNN correspondent based in London, he reported from Iraq, Jordan and Kuwait in the run-up to the first Gulf War and during its aftermath. Rob’s reports from Somalia during the US and UN-led peacekeeping mission were part of CNN’s Emmy Award-winning coverage of the crisis. Rob has also been the recipient of an International Citation, Robert F Kennedy Memorial Journalism Award, for his “Famine in Africa” piece for CNN in 1993.

 

Lucia Newman has 25 years of experience in television and journalism, which encompasses roles with the BBC, ARD, NBC, ABC, 7 Network, Sydney Morning Herald, Radio 2GB and CNN. An expert covering Latin America, before coming to Al Jazeera English Lucia was most recently CNN’s Havana bureau chief and correspondent. Prior to her Cuban posting, she was CNN’s senior correspondent in Latin America, and bureau chief in Mexico from 1993-1997, Chile from 1989-1993, Nicaragua from 1985-1989 and Panama in 1987.  She has reported on the Contra war in Nicaragua, South America’s drug involvement and unrest in Panama under former dictator Manuel Noriega. While based in Cuba, Lucia covered the 1998 Papal visit and the 1998 bomb attacks on Havana hotels, in addition to conducting several exclusive interviews with Cuban President Fidel Castro.
A recipient of many awards in journalism, in 2001 Lucia picked up the prestigious Edward R. Morrow Award for ‘sustained coverage of Elian Gonzalez’, the child at the centre of a heated custody and immigration battle in 2000 involving the Cuban and US governments.

Caracas, Venezuela

 

A distinguished war correspondent, Mariana Sanchez has travelled the world covering major world events such as the war in Kosovo, the conflict in East Timor, the conflict in Macedonia, the war between Ethiopia and Eritrea, and the ‘war on terrorism’ from both Pakistan and Afghanistan. Before joining Al Jazeera English, Mariana Sanchez built her career with international news organisations including CNN Espanol, Panamericana Television, ATV, The Wall Street Journal Americas, UNIVISION and Agence France Presse. Mariana has also done work for The Los Angeles Times and reported for Radio Monitor on the 2004 Afghanistan elections. She has also contributed to Radio France International, Mexican Radio Monitor, Peru’s Caretas magazine, Mexico’s Diario Monitor newspaper, amongst others. In 1992, she received a prestigious Emmy award for her special series on children and guns in the streets of New York.

 

Kristen Saloomey has 15 years of news reporting from across the United States with NBC affiliates. Career highlights include her stories on the election of Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton and the trial of the cell known as “the Lackawanna Six. Kristen is a Lebanese American who is experienced in print as well as broadcast media, in addition to her work for NBC affiliates she has written news for MTV, the youth-oriented American music television network. Kristen has a master’s degree from the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism where she was awarded the CNN fellowship, which involved writing, producing and reporting for the network.

 

Mark Seddon
UN Correspondent Mark Seddon has a wide and varied range of experience from his work as an editor, journalist, broadcaster, political adviser and commentator. In his most recent role as editor of the internationally-renowned weekly magazine Tribune, Mark was responsible for editing, commissioning and leader writing. He has also worked as a commentator and diarist on the London Evening Standard and as a contributor to the Evening Standard, The Times, The Independent, The Guardian, Daily Mail, The Daily Telegraph, New Statesman and Private Eye. Between 1997 and 2000 Mark was elected to the UK Labour Party’s ruling National Executive Committee, and was re-elected in 2001.

 

Broadcast Centre: London, UK
With a career of over 23 years in broadcast journalism, Alan Fisher has reported for the UK’s GMTV from across the world.  Alan was the station’s Chief Correspondent for six years, a role in which he covered the war in Bosnia, the end of the siege of Sarajevo, and the huge humanitarian crisis caused by the bloody Rwandan civil war. Alan also spent ten weeks in Baghdad leading GMTV’s coverage of the last Gulf War. Most recently he covered major stories in the UK and abroad including a three-part series on poverty in Africa. Previously as GMTV’s Senior News Correspondent, Alan filed reports on the Dunblane massacre; the death of Diana Princess of Wales from Paris; the 1998 World Cup and UK/US air strikes in Iraq. He joined GMTV as the station’s first Ireland correspondent – setting up the bureau in Belfast and reporting major events including the Shankill bomb, the Loughinisland and Greysteel massacres and the early steps in the peace process including the first ceasefires.

 

Athens, Greece

Europe correspondent Barnaby Phillips has 15 years of experience in television and radio journalism with the BBC, during which he also contributed to The Financial Times, The Daily Telegraph and The Economist. Barnaby’s most recent role as the BBC’s Southern Africa Correspondent was based in Johannesburg, South Africa. He reported from across the Southern Africa region and also worked in the Middle East, West Africa and Asia. His major stories in these regions included the AIDS epidemic, humanitarian crises in Darfur, war in Liberia, the 2002 Southern African food crises, war in Iraq and the South Asian tsunami. Barnaby reported regularly for BBC flagship programmes including Today on Radio 4, Newsnight on BBC2, the Ten O’Clock News on BBC 1, as well as BBC World television and World Service radio. Previously Barnaby was the BBC’s Nigeria Correspondent between 1998 and 2001 and was based in Lagos. Responsible for radio and television coverage of Africa’s most populous country and its neighbours, he reported on the end of Nigeria’s military rule, religious and ethnic conflicts, as well as the war in Sierra Leone and upheavals in the Ivory Coast.

 

Moscow, Russia
Jonah Hull has worked in the international television news industry for 10 years, with extensive experience covering breaking news, conflict and natural disasters around the world. Most recently, Jonah was a London-based reporter for British satellite broadcaster Sky News. He covered stories including the G8 summit in Edinburgh, the London bombings in July 2005 and the 2003 Boxing Day earthquake in Bam, Iran. In December 2005, he spent a month with US marines in Iraq’s western desert filming the hour-long documentary, ‘Raider Nation’ for Sky News. Previously with Associated Press Television News (APTN), Jonah travelled extensively, in Israel and the Palestinian territories during the second Intifada, and in other conflict zones like Kosovo, Macedonia and Sierra Leone. He was also part of the agency’s team covering the second Gulf War in Iraq. In 2001, Jonah was among the first western journalists to enter Afghanistan immediately prior to the American bombing campaign, crossing the border from Iran and meeting Taliban fighters there. He was one of the first reporters to be ’embedded’ with US forces in Kandahar, Afghanistan.

 

*****

About Al Jazeera English
 
Al Jazeera English is the world’s first English language news channel to be headquartered in the Middle East.
 
Broadcasting from within the Middle East, looking outwards, Al Jazeera English will set the news agenda and act as a bridge between cultures.
 
With unique access as the channel of reference for Middle East events, and broadcast centres strategically placed around the world in Doha, Kuala Lumpur, London and Washington DC, Al Jazeera English will balance the information flow from South to North, providing accurate, impartial and objective news for a global audience from a grass roots level, giving voice to different perspectives from under-reported regions around the world.
 
Al Jazeera English is building on the ground-breaking heritage of its sister Arab-language channel – Al Jazeera, which was responsible for changing the face of news within the Middle East, now extending that fresh perspective from regional to global. 
 

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