NY Times appoints Arraf as Baghdad bureau chief

Jane Arraf will be joining The New York Times as its new Baghdad bureau chief next month. Her deep understanding of the region, consummate reporting skills and spoken Arabic make her a perfect fit for this role.

The new hiring comes as Alissa Rubin left her second tour as Baghdad bureau chief to pursue a Nieman fellowship.

Arraf joins The Times from NPR, where she covered Iraq, Jordan and other countries. She has also worked as a correspondent at the Christian Science Monitor, covering Iraq and the Middle East, and she held the same post at both al-Jazeera English and NBC News.

She also opened CNN’s Baghdad bureau in 1998 and for years was the only Western correspondent living there. She has also served as Istanbul bureau chief at CNN.

Arraf has also worked at Reuters for a long time. She joined the company as a correspondent in 1984. Then, in 1988, she was made correspondent/desk editor. From 1990 to 1993, she was correspondent/bureau chief Amman, Jordan.

From 1993 to 1996, Arraf served as Reuters correspondent/desk editor, New York, and from 1996 onwards, she was a correspondent, Washington, D.C., at Reuters Financial Television.

A former Edward R. Murrow fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations, Arraf has won Peabody and Overseas Press Club of America awards.