COUNTERVIEWS: Patrick Cockburn talks about Iraq (part 1)

Click to Play

Tao Ruspoli interviews Patrick Cockburn (pronounced kōbɜːn) (born March 5, 1951) 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 Jerusalem 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.

Cockburn was born in Scotland 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.

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.