Roula Khalaf Razzouk

Roula Khalaf Razzouk     (editor)
Born	May 1965 Beirut, Lebanon
Residence	UK
Nationality	Lebanese, British
Alma mater	Syracuse University, Columbia University
Spouse	Assaad Wajdi Razzouk
Interest of	"Philip Cross"
FT Editor alleged to be complicit in faking evidence to promote the Skripal affair official narrative  Financial Times/Editor In office 20 January 2020 - Present Preceded by Roula Khalaf Razzouk  Financial Times/Editor In office 2016 - 20 January 2020 Succeeded by Roula Khalaf Razzouk

Roula Khalaf is, writes John Helmer "the only editor of a major London newspaper about whom next to nothing important is obvious, not even her name."

Background

Khalaf was born in Beirut, Lebanon, and grew up there during the civil war. Her husband’s name is Assaad Wajdi Razzouk, a former banker now an influential figure in renewable energy schemes. Both have their background in the well-known el-Solh family of Beirut. From the el-Solhs have come four Lebanese prime ministers on the Sunni moslem side of the Beirut line; together with considerable wealth which the family has accumulated over almost a century. Assaad Razzouk’s business "is deceptively complicated; his wife’s deceptively simple."

Career

Khalaf began her career as a staff writer for Forbes magazine in New York, and worked for the magazine for about four years.

She has worked for the FT since 1995, first as North Africa correspondent, then Middle East correspondent, Middle East editor and as foreign editor. She covered the 2003 invasion of Iraq and the Arab Spring colour revolutions. In 2016, she was promoted to be deputy editor of the Financial Times. In addition to her deputy editor responsibilities, she writes and comments regularly on world affairs, Middle East politics and business.

Activities

Helmer writes that "She has advanced over the past 25 years, FT sources claim, by taking orders from her superiors and never reporting outside the guidelines of the FT’s management".

"The Austrian disclosures also reveal that in London the Financial Times editor, Roula Khalaf, four of the newspaper’s reporters, and the management of the Japanese-owned company have fabricated a false and misleading version of the OPCW evidence and have covered up British government lying on the Skripal blood testing and the Novichok evidence."

Pegasus

In July 2021, her number was included in a leaked list of mobile phone numbers selected for possible surveillance by clients of NSO, an Israeli firm that manufactures spyware and sells it to governments. Its principal product, Pegasus, is capable of compromising a phone, extracting all of the data stored on the device and activating its microphone to eavesdrop on conversations. Analysis of the leaked data suggests that Khalaf’s phone was selected as a possible target by the United Arab Emirates (UAE).

Another way at looking at the "leaking" of her name, is that it is an attempt to give her 'street cred' as an independent journalist.

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