Patrick Cockburn

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Patrick Cockburn (pronounced kōbɜːn) (born March 5, 1950) is an Irish journalist who has been a Middle East correspondent since 1979 for the Financial Times and the Independent . Among the most experienced commentators on Iraq, he was one of the few journalists to remain in Baghdad during the first Gulf War. He is based in [Iraq] as a correspondent for the Independent, and has been filing reports on the war in Iraq. He has consistently displayed a pessimistic outlook for Iraq's future and considers the 2003 invasion of Iraq and its aftermath as a catastophic failure. He was the winner of the Martha Gelhorn Prize in 2005 and the James Cameron Prize in 2006

Cockburn was born in Ireland and grew up in County Cork, Ireland. His father was the well-known socialist author and journalist Claud Cockburn. He was educated at Glenalmond College, Perthshire, and Trinity College, Oxford.

Cockburn married Janet Montefiore, daughter of Rt Rev Hugh William Montefiore, and has two children, Henry Claud and Alexander. He has two brothers, Alexander Cockburn and Andrew Cockburn who are also journalists.

His most recent book, following award-winning reporting from Iraq, is "The Occupation" published by Verso Books. Mixing first hand accounts with reporting, Cockburn's book is critical of the invasion as well as the Salafi fundamentalists who comprise much of the resistance. "The Occupation" has been nominated for the 2006 National Book Critics Circle award for nonfiction.

Cockburn's memoir is The Broken Boy, a memoir of his childhood in 1950s Ireland when he caught and survived polio. His previous books include Out of the Ashes: The Resurrection of Saddam Hussein, written with Andrew Cockburn.