Orla Guerin

Who is Orla Guerin?

Orla Guerin MBE is an Irish correspondent currently working for BBC News based in Islamabad. She was previously an Africa correspondent and has also been a Middle East correspondent. She has reported from areas including the West Coast of the USA, Kosovo, the Republic of Macedonia, the Basque Country in northern Spain, and Moscow, where she covered the Kursk submarine disaster in 2000.

Guerin was born in Dublin. A journalism graduate from Dublin Institute of Technology, she qualified as a journalist in 1985 with a Certificate in Journalism from the College of Commerce in Dublin. She also holds a Master's degree in Film Studies from University College Dublin.

Guerin first came to attention as a journalist and foreign correspondent with RTÉ News. Guerin joined Raidió Teilifís Éireann in 1987 and was their correspondent in Eastern Europe from 1990–1994, travelling widely and reporting from Eastern and Central Europe, the former Soviet Union, Yugoslavia and Sarajevo. Guerin's reports from Eastern Europe for RTÉ Radio won her a Jacob's Award in 1992.

She left RTÉ to run as a Labour Party candidate in the 1994 elections to the European Parliament. A political novice, Guerin had been hand-picked by then Labour Party leader Dick Spring. Even though she was not selected at the party convention, Spring insisted that she be added to the ballot. Vilified as a "parachute" candidate, she did not win a seat. She joined the BBC in 1995.