Hello, I’m a journalist, writer and editor based in London. 

Until recently I was the Observer’s international editor, writing a weekly column as well as commissioning and editing the newspaper’s global coverage. Before that, I spent five years as the Observer’s head of news, leading its national and international coverage, which included Covid, wars in Ukraine and Gaza, and the rise and fall of four prime ministers.

I’ve reported from more than 60 countries around the world - covering the genocide in Darfur in the late 2000s and the FARC peace talks in Havana in 2015, reporting on Russia’s disinformation TV network, RT, in 2014, and spending a bizarre 10 days in North Korea in 2004. I won the Orwell Prize for journalism in 2019 for a series of articles about Britain’s role in the world, and this interview with Seymour Hersh. 

I once suggested Brazil, Sweden and Turkey set up a diplomatic alliance (which they did, albeit briefly) and I also spent a day with the real Santa Claus (and gave him a lift in my rented Kia).

I was deputy editor at Prospect magazine, spent several years as Monocle’s foreign editor, and before that I was Africa correspondent for the Independent.

My first book, Africa United: How football explains Africa, was published by Canongate in 2010 and was named one of the books of the year by both the Financial Times and Metro.

I’m also an experienced podcast host. I created the Foreign Desk at Monocle Radio, which was named by iTunes and the Financial Times as one of the best podcasts of the year, and also hosted the pretty decent but badly named How to Fix podcast for Prospect.

You can contact me at steve.j.bloomfield@gmail.com. My literary agent is Toby Mundy at Aevitas Creative Management