In March, I spent several days in the company of Kim Sengupta, who has died suddenly, aged 68. We were on a trip to Israel and the West Bank. He was an inspirational foreign and war correspondent of great courage, resilience, and determination. I sat next to him on the flight out to Tel Aviv and, as we enjoyed a gin and tonic, it was fascinating to talk to him about his early days in journalism, working in local papers and then at the Daily Mail. We also chatted about our mutual love of cricket. He had a rich, warm, deep voice and was a man of considerable charm and good humour. He loved newsrooms and newspapers and was invariably thinking about his next trip, the next report.
He spent nearly 30 years at the Independent as defence and diplomatic correspondent and editor. He was revered in our trade for his curiosity, bravery and determination to report from the world’s war zones. The last time I saw him he was preparing to head to the far north of Israel, to the Lebanon border – towards conflict and danger.
This report by Charlotte Tobitt has just been published in our sister publication, UK Press Gazette:
The Independent’s veteran war correspondent Kim Sengupta has died suddenly aged 68 in a “devastating loss” for the news title.
Sengupta had worked at the Independent since 1996 as defence and diplomatic correspondent and editor, covering every major conflict of the past 30 years. The newsbrand announced his death on Tuesday.
The Independent’s editor-in-chief, Geordie Greig, said: “The sudden death of Kim Sengupta is a devastating loss for the Independent as well as for the wider world of journalism. Kim was a reporter’s reporter. He lived for the story and courageously covered countless conflicts from Iraq to Ukraine.
“I first knew him more 40 years ago when he was a general reporter in Fleet Street, and from those early days hugely admired his tenacious and tireless ambition to quest and pursue. He lived and worked ferociously hard, more often than not on the frontline, with a Hemingway swagger as he travelled the globe for the Independent.
“Modestly, he downplayed the dangers of war even as he told of the trials and tribulations of reporting with zest, humour and humanity.”
During his career, in which he also worked as a reporter for the Daily Mail and the now-defunct Today newspaper before he joined the Independent, Sengupta covered conflicts including in Afghanistan, Iraq, Syria, Libya, the Balkans, Ukraine, Georgia, Kosovo, Mali, Sudan, Somalia, Kashmir, Israel, Gaza and Northern Ireland.
In 2012 Sengupta wrote for Press Gazette about the difficulties of reporting from Syria with frequent power outages and even satellite transmission being blocked – resulting in a temperamental 3G dongle being his only option. “For the first time ever, bear in mind I’ve worked everywhere from Helmand to Haiti, you simply couldn’t make it work.”
He added: “On safety, there’s not an awful lot you can do, because a lot of the attacks are not targeted but random. It’s not as bad as Baghdad from 2004 to 2008, where you faced suicide bombings.
“The obvious thing to do was not hang to around with large numbers of rebel fighters for too long, not to stay in particular areas for too long and although the shelling and air strikes were random, there were certain times when they were less frequent than others and it was a case of using the time to maximise how much you can cover.”
Speaking on a Reporters Without Borders panel last year, Sengupta said reporting from Ukraine was “dangerous” for journalists but not as much as in Iraq in “the really bad days”.
“But the difference is it’s the first war that many of us have covered [in which] two relatively modern states” were fighting, he said.
Sengupta’s awards and credits include being named Journalist of the Year at the Asian Media Awards in 2016.
Afterwards he said of the industry: “It’s tough. Print journalism in particular is going through tremendous problems at the moment with falling circulation, falling advertising.
“But when I speak to students at universities and schools, there are extraordinary numbers that want to be journalists.
“I ask them in the current climate: ‘Why do they want to be journalists when they could be making more money in the city or doing law?’
“But they still have got this desire to explain what journalism is, to try and understand issues. It’s going to be tough but they will enjoy it.”
Among his other award recognitions, Sengupta was a finalist for Foreign Affairs Journalist of the Year at the British Journalism Awards 2013 and his reporting from Iran was referenced in the shortlisting of The Independent for News Provider of the Year at the same awards in 2020. He was also shortlisted for the London Press Club’s Print Journalist of the Year award in 2020/21 and racked up three nominations for the Orwell Prize for Journalism.
Sengupta also gave back, including by acting as part of the judging panel for Private Eye’s Paul Foot Award for Investigative and Campaigning Journalism as recently as this year.
His final bylines were less than a week before his death, with a comment piece headlined: “Has Netanyahu finally lost support in America?” published on Thursday.
Chris Blackhurst, former editor at the Independent, said: “In many years of working with Kim Sengupta I never came across anyone so fearless.
“As editor, you get to appreciate which journalists are ‘high maintenance’, constantly and painfully seeking approval and reassurance. Kim, despite the places he went, was most definitely not one of those. If he said he was going somewhere, he went there.
“He had an extraordinary knack for talking to anyone, be they ambassadors or generals or privates or those of an unspecified background – security services most probably – and extracting information from them. Kim really was one of a kind.”
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