Stephen Sackur
Journalist & the award-winning presenter of BBC HARDtalk
Profile
Stephen Sackur is a renowned English journalist, and the award-winning presenter of HARDtalk, BBC World News’ flagship current affairs interview programme. He has been a journalist with BBC News since 1986, as BBC European, Washington, Middle East and Foreign Correspondent.
He is widely respected as an outstanding interviewer and moderator, with a superb knowledge of current affairs, and an affable, yet no nonsense style. Capable of getting right to the heart of the matter of a vast range of subjects and issues, Sackur is among the finest of presenters. He was awarded the ‘International TV Personality of the Year Award’ by the Association of International Broadcasters in 2010, and nominated as ‘Speech Broadcaster of the Year’ at the Sony Radio Awards 2013.
Since becoming presenter of HARDtalk in 2004, he has interviewed prominent international personalities, including former US vice-president Al Gore, President Hugo Chávez of Venezuela, President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva of Brazil, and a host of other leaders and politicians from around the world. He has also interviewed leading cultural figures including Gore Vidal, Richard Dawkins, and Noam Chomsky.
He has contributed countless articles to The Observer, The London Review of Books, New Statesman, The Guardian and The Daily Telegraph. In 1991 he wrote ‘On the Basra Road’. Sackur studied at Emmanuel College, Cambridge, and Harvard University’s John F. Kennedy School of Government.