Hamid Mir

Hamid Mir (Urdu: حامد میر; born 23 July 1966) is a Pakistani journalist, columnist and writer. Mir initially worked as a journalist with Pakistani newspapers. He has hosted the political talk show Capital Talk on Geo News intermittently since 2002. He writes columns for Urdu as well as English newspapers, both national and international. He has been a contributor to the Global Opinions section of The Washington Post since June 2021. He is well known for his stance against the dominance of the Establishment in Pakistan. Having survived two assassination attempts, Mir has been banned from television three times, and has lost his job twice due to his stand for press freedom and human rights.

Born in Lahore to a journalistic family, Mir is one of the few journalists in the world to have interviewed Osama bin Laden after the September 11 attacks along with Tayseer Allouni. During his career, Mir has also interviewed various world leaders which includes former UN Secretary-General Ban Ki Moon, US Secretary of State John Kerry, US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, Prime Minister of United Kingdom Tony Blair, US Secretary of State Colin Powell, President of South Africa Nelson Mandela, President of Iran Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, President of Palestine Yasser Arafat, Deputy Prime Minister of India L.K. Advani, President of Afghanistan Hamid Karzai, and President of Israel Shimon Peres. A few of the notable Pakistani political figures which Hamid Mir has interviewed include Benazir Bhutto, Pervez Musharraf, Asif Ali Zardari, Nawaz Sharif, Imran Khan, Mir Zafaruallah Khan Jamali, and President Arif Alvi. Mir has also interviewed actors such as Shah Rukh Khan and Aamir Khan.

He was awarded with the civil award Hilal-i-Imtiaz for his work for Pakistan. In 2016, he was awarded the "Most Resilient Journalist Award" in The Hague by Free Press Unlimited. In 2017, he was awarded the lifetime achievement award by former Prime Minister Zafarullah Khan Jamali, at Government College University Lahore, for his work as a news anchor.

Hamid Mir is the only journalist in South Asia to cover wars and conflicts in Afghanistan, Iraq, Lebanon, Syria, Palestine, Bosnia and Sri Lanka. For his war and conflict reporting, he was awarded SAARC Lifetime Achievement Award in 2010 in New Delhi.

Hamid Mir is regular participant in international seminars and conferences on security, human rights and press freedom. He has delivered lectures at Harvard University, Yale University, University of Oxford, London School of Economics and University of California, Berkeley.