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Phil is a Welsh born reporter and television director who has won more than a dozen international awards for his work. After a career
spanning more than twenty years for the BBC, Phil set up his own production company,
Out of Office Films, based in London and has made films for Channel 4 in the UK
and most recently, he presented a six part series for the Al Jazeera Network, based
on his book on the roots of terrorism. Phil has covered Asia, the Middle East and
the America’s for the BBC’s current affairs’ |
|
department. He either presented
or produced more than 40 documentaries. His reports have also appeared on Radio
4’s Today programme, the Nine O’Clock News and Newsnight. He has also presented
shows on BBC World Television, Press TV and BBC World Service Radio. |
 |
|
Phil in the centre with the guerrilla commander, Oussama on the right.
|
PHIL’S TV EXPERIENCE
Phil graduated from Oxford University with degree in Philosophy, Politics and Economics.
In 1982, he joined the BBC as a trainee journalist and began his career as a junior
reporter on the television news in Northern Ireland.
Phil’s first foreign reporting
was in Sri Lanka in the 1980s, when his stories brought to the world’s attention
the bitter civil war between Sinhalese nationalists and the government. In India,
he made films on the violent insurrection by Sikhs in the Punjab region. He has
regularly reported from Kashmir and in 1998 won the Silver Nymph at the Monte Carlo Television Festival for his film The Unfinished War. With unique access to the armies of both India and Pakistan, he tells the story of a conflict that has continued for half century between two nations that are now nuclear powers.
Phil has also
spent a lot of time in Cambodia, a country with a special place in his heart. He
reported on the war from 1989 onwards and in 1997, made a film on the country’s
strongman, Hun Sen for the Correspondent series. In 2001, gained the first television
interview with Pol Pot’s deputy, Nuon Chea.
Phil covered extensively the conflict
in Afghanistan during the late 1980s. He filmed frontline fighting with both the
Soviet backed regime in Kabul, and the mujahideen guerrillas. He was one of the
first journalists to enter Kabul when the Taliban fled in November 2001. Last year,
he was with a US Army platoon when it was attacked by Taliban fighters in Eastern
Afghanistan. For the same series, he met and interviewed Taliban fighters in the
Tribal Areas of Pakistan.
Phil has made films on most of the major issues in the
Middle East. He spent a week with Hizbollah guerrillas and showed their struggle
against Israeli occupation of Southern Lebanon. He first went to Gaza after the
launch of the intifada in 1987 and has regularly reported on the Palestinian issue.
He gained unique access to the Iran’s Basidj militiamen in his film The Guardians
of the Ayatollah, which explored the debate inside Iran over the future direction
of the Islamic Revolution.
In 1992, he obtained the first television interview with
a member of the Gama’a Islamiya, the Islamic militant group challenging the Egyptian
state.
Phil remains the only western journalist to have travelled and filmed with
Algeria’s Islamic militants, in a conflict that has cost 200,000 lives. His 1994
film, Algeria’s Hidden War revealed the scale of a conflict rarely glimpsed by the
outside world. The film won awards at the Royal Television Society in London, as
well as the New York and Monte Carlo film festivals.
His reporting on the war in Kosovo in 1998 won him a Prix Bayeux Des Correspondents de Guerre award. His film,
The Serbs’ Last Stand, won that year’s Royal Television Society award for best foreign
documentary. The film also won a Silver medal at the 1998 New York Television Festival.
Sloba and Mira, a profile of Slobodan Milosevic and his wife, made just before war
broke out in Europe, was described by the Financial Times as “excellent” and shortlisted
for an RTS.
He has also covered the wars in Iraq and Colombia, as well as the fight
against apartheid in South Africa. He has also worked in Indonesia, North Korea,
Mongolia, Nigeria, Kenya, the Soviet Union, east Germany and so on.
Phil has also worked as series producer for Planet Islam (3 x 60 for BBCTWO in 1996), which was
described by the Independent as ‘foreign affairs journalism at its best’, and for
Druglands (3 x 60 min for BBCTWO 2004), a candid portrayal of drug usage in Britain.
WRITING
Phil’s book Dining with Terrorists was published by Macmillan in 2005 and
described by the Guardian as ‘an outstanding book…the vivid writing links his interviews
with smiling killers into a kind of globe-trotting adventure story, as readable
as it is informative’. The book argues the need to negotiate – even with those considered
‘terrorists’ in the West. According to The British Journalism Review, ‘This thoughtful,
controversial book should be compulsory reading for every editor, journalist and
politician – before it is too late.’ Noam Chomsky described it as ‘an amazing tour
de force’.
Phil has also written articles for the New Statesman, Sunday Times, Independent,
Guardian and numerous other publications. He is a regular contributor to the Italian
gastronomic magazine, Slow Food.
He currently lives in London and is preparing his
second book.
E-mail: phil@philrees.tv |
|
Phil is a Welsh born reporter and television director who has won more than a dozen international awards for his work. After a career
spanning more than twenty years for the BBC, Phil set up his own production company,
Out of Office Films, based in London and has made films for Channel 4 in the UK
and most recently, he presented a six part series for the Al Jazeera Network, based
on his book on the roots of terrorism. Phil has covered Asia, the Middle East and
the America’s for the BBC’s current affairs’ |
|
department. He either presented
or produced more than 40 documentaries. His reports have also appeared on Radio
4’s Today programme, the Nine O’Clock News and Newsnight. He has also presented
shows on BBC World Television, Press TV and BBC World Service Radio. |
|
|
Phil in the centre with the guerrilla commander, Oussama on the right.
|
PHIL’S TV EXPERIENCE
Phil graduated from Oxford University with degree in Philosophy, Politics and Economics.
In 1982, he joined the BBC as a trainee journalist and began his career as a junior
reporter on the television news in Northern Ireland.
Phil’s first foreign reporting
was in Sri Lanka in the 1980s, when his stories brought to the world’s attention
the bitter civil war between Sinhalese nationalists and the government. In India,
he made films on the violent insurrection by Sikhs in the Punjab region. He has
regularly reported from Kashmir and in 1998 won the Silver Nymph at the Monte Carlo Television Festival for his film The Unfinished War. With unique access to the armies of both India and Pakistan, he tells the story of a conflict that has continued for half century between two nations that are now nuclear powers.
Phil has also
spent a lot of time in Cambodia, a country with a special place in his heart. He
reported on the war from 1989 onwards and in 1997, made a film on the country’s
strongman, Hun Sen for the Correspondent series. In 2001, gained the first television
interview with Pol Pot’s deputy, Nuon Chea.
Phil covered extensively the conflict
in Afghanistan during the late 1980s. He filmed frontline fighting with both the
Soviet backed regime in Kabul, and the mujahideen guerrillas. He was one of the
first journalists to enter Kabul when the Taliban fled in November 2001. Last year,
he was with a US Army platoon when it was attacked by Taliban fighters in Eastern
Afghanistan. For the same series, he met and interviewed Taliban fighters in the
Tribal Areas of Pakistan.
Phil has made films on most of the major issues in the
Middle East. He spent a week with Hizbollah guerrillas and showed their struggle
against Israeli occupation of Southern Lebanon. He first went to Gaza after the
launch of the intifada in 1987 and has regularly reported on the Palestinian issue.
He gained unique access to the Iran’s Basidj militiamen in his film The Guardians
of the Ayatollah, which explored the debate inside Iran over the future direction
of the Islamic Revolution.
In 1992, he obtained the first television interview with
a member of the Gama’a Islamiya, the Islamic militant group challenging the Egyptian
state.
Phil remains the only western journalist to have travelled and filmed with
Algeria’s Islamic militants, in a conflict that has cost 200,000 lives. His 1994
film, Algeria’s Hidden War revealed the scale of a conflict rarely glimpsed by the
outside world. The film won awards at the Royal Television Society in London, as
well as the New York and Monte Carlo film festivals.
His reporting on the war in Kosovo in 1998 won him a Prix Bayeux Des Correspondents de Guerre award. His film,
The Serbs’ Last Stand, won that year’s Royal Television Society award for best foreign
documentary. The film also won a Silver medal at the 1998 New York Television Festival.
Sloba and Mira, a profile of Slobodan Milosevic and his wife, made just before war
broke out in Europe, was described by the Financial Times as “excellent” and shortlisted
for an RTS.
He has also covered the wars in Iraq and Colombia, as well as the fight
against apartheid in South Africa. He has also worked in Indonesia, North Korea,
Mongolia, Nigeria, Kenya, the Soviet Union, east Germany and so on.
Phil has also worked as series producer for Planet Islam (3 x 60 for BBCTWO in 1996), which was
described by the Independent as ‘foreign affairs journalism at its best’, and for
Druglands (3 x 60 min for BBCTWO 2004), a candid portrayal of drug usage in Britain.
WRITING
Phil’s book Dining with Terrorists was published by Macmillan in 2005 and
described by the Guardian as ‘an outstanding book…the vivid writing links his interviews
with smiling killers into a kind of globe-trotting adventure story, as readable
as it is informative’. The book argues the need to negotiate – even with those considered
‘terrorists’ in the West. According to The British Journalism Review, ‘This thoughtful,
controversial book should be compulsory reading for every editor, journalist and
politician – before it is too late.’ Noam Chomsky described it as ‘an amazing tour
de force’.
Phil has also written articles for the New Statesman, Sunday Times, Independent,
Guardian and numerous other publications. He is a regular contributor to the Italian
gastronomic magazine, Slow Food.
He currently lives in London and is preparing his
second book.
E-mail: phil@philrees.tv |
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