Mark Seddon
Mark Seddon is the former United Nations Correspondent and New York Bureau Chief for Al-Jazeera English TV. He reported from eighteen countries during that time, including North Korea, China, Haiti, Syria, Libya, Yemen, Ethiopia and the Democratic Republic of Congo. He has interviewed, amongst others, Ban Ki-Moon, Lech Walesa, Tony Blair, Hans Blix, Michael Foot, Mia Farrow, and George Clooney. In a journalistic career spanning over twenty years, he has been Editor of Tribune and an elected member of the UK Labour Party's National Executive Committee. He has written for most British newspapers and many magazines, including The Guardian, The Independent, The Daily Mail, The Times, The Spectator, New Statesman, Private Eye, British Journalism Review and Country Life Magazine. For a number of years he was a Diarist at the London Evening Standard, and has also reported for, amongst others, the BBC and Sky TV. He lives in Buckingham, England.
Britain’s Opposition leader, Ed Miliband has emerged from two national crises with flying colours. He may have been a little late coming to the first – the Murdoch hacking scandal – but […]
The fires have been dampened, the tottering ruins of wrecked buildings have been demolished. Gradually people have begun going about their business. Touchingly many of those who took the brunt […]
It is the thirtieth anniversary of the Toxteth riots in what was better known then as the Liverpool 8 district. I remember the shocking scenes, as a corner of that […]
Amidst all of the market babble and financial gobbledegook that poured from both ‘analysts’ and ‘practitioners’ following last week’s global market meltdown, came a shaft of light. It took the […]
Had Piers Morgan stuck with the celebrity thing, I suspect that the hacking storm would have touched him, but not engulfed him. Celebrity twitter is what Morgan knows, and it […]
One there was ‘Watergate’; now every minor, irritating little faux scandal as the mocniker ‘gate’ attached to it. The latest being ‘Tipgate’, an August silly season story that has found […]
No journalist worth his or her salt should rejoice in the downfall of another. There are plenty of commentators in particular that I could name who infuriate me, who have […]
For centuries, the best of radical journalists, campaigners and trades unionists have railed against the British Establishment. They have largely had good cause to do so. The apex of the […]
July 13th. Unlucky for some. Unlucky for Rupert Murdoch and the News Corporation mafia in particular. Last week there was catharsis as Britain’s shabby political establishment suddenly realised that the […]
Sales of the doomed News of the World increased by 30% we are reliably informed on the day the newspaper closed, and on the day Rupert Murdoch flew in dressed […]
It was so ordained that James, rather than Rupert Murdoch, announced the closure of the News of the World, the 168 year old tabloid, after the presses roll this Sunday. […]
Today is the day that the sound of chickens coming noisily home to roost was heard all over the United Kingdom. It began with a BBC radio interview of the […]
A Guardian newspaper investigation in Britain has revealed that one of Rupert Murdoch’s newspapers, the mass selling tabloid, ‘News of the World’, hired a private investigator to hack into the […]
Journalist Mark Seddon writes that "Greece should be allowed to de-fault and regain its currency. The Euro zone may shrink in the process, but it would be more realistic for it."
Neo liberalism is in crisis. Discuss. If only I were back at some red brick university and being asked this question by one of my lecturers! Neo liberalism is in […]
Sometime very soon, the Secretary General of the United Nations, Ban ki moon, is set to announce his intention to run for a second five year term. In this he […]
That the former Serb General Ratko Mladic was able to escape detection for sixteen years, beggars belief. The relative’s house he used as a ‘safe house’ was reportedly searched some […]
The arrest of former Serbian military chief, Ratko Mladic finally begins to draw a line underneath the unspeakable savagery that characterised the break-up of the former Yugoslavia. Mladic was the […]
So as Americans like our Queen, we Brits tend to like your Presidents. I happen to like this President, which meant that the usual bile I reserve for the saccharine […]
The other day I was stopped by police officers as I was going through security at the House of Commons. Astonishingly they took me to one side and confiscated a […]
Am I the only person to be becoming just a little irritated by the twice daily claim of Tina Brown’s Daily Beastto have got “the morning scoop” or “ afternoon […]
In the days of the Wild West, the posters used to read ‘Wanted! Dead or Alive’. Now in the White House we must presume they read, ‘Wanted! Dead,Not Alive!’ This […]
No sooner had Britain voted in a referendum on a new voting system, the demand for a new referendum came bellowing from north of the border following the resounding victory […]
I hate to be a party pooper. Nor am I natural believer in conspiracy theories. I tend to subscribe to the ‘cock up’ rather than ‘conspiracy’ view, and I’ve rarely […]
I hate to be a party pooper. Nor am I natural believer in conspiracy theories. I tend to subscribe to the ‘cock up’ rather than ‘conspiracy’ view, and I’ve rarely […]
I passed a wishing well recently, or rather a fountain full of coins tossed in by passers by. I was always told to make a wish in secret as I […]
Perhaps I shouldn’t be surprised. Some of the most enthusiastic about the upcoming Royal Wedding between Kate Middleton and Prince William are American friends of mine. We have already despatched […]
The Strange Death of Radical Journalism And so to another inconvenient truth that should trouble anyone interested in the clash of ideas, real passion in journalism, polemic and a radicalism […]
If anyone imagined that the act of intervention by itself is always enough for the United Nations to emerge unscathed, one only need to look at the chequered history of […]
At the end of last week, Rupert Murdoch’s News Corporation officially apologised for hacking into the phones of politicians and celebrities. In doing so the company judged that it was […]