Middle East challenge: Coming to grips with Islam, democracy and terrorism

Robin Wright, a five-time Pulitzer Prize nominee, is a global affairs correspondent for The Los Angeles Times. She has had extended tours of duty outside the United States, reporting from more than 130 countries. Ms. Wright has spent more than five years in the Middle East, two years in Europe, and seven years in Africa, as well as stints in Latin America and Asia. A 1970 graduate of the University of Michigan, Robin Wright was among the first journalists to write about the emergence of radical Islam in the Middle East and to explore the connections between religious belief and political action. She has explored these questions in depth in books such as Sacred Rage in which she examines the roots, motives, and goals of the Islamic resurgence and relates them to current events such as conflict in Afghanistan. Ms. Wright has been widely recognized for the depth and breadth of her knowledge about Iran, a country she has lived in and reported on with regularity since 1973.In 1989 Ms. Wright won the National Magazine Award for her reporting from Iran that was published in The New Yorker. She also won the Overseas Press Club Award for 'best reporting in any medium requiring exceptional courage and initiative' for her work on the war in Angola. During her career she has reported on nine wars and several revolutions.