About the Speaker
Jeta
Xharra
Investigative journalist
Jeta Xharra is a Kosovar journalist and director of the Balkan Investigative Reporting Network’s Kosovo division. Xharra is the presenter and editor of the television debate show “Life in Kosovo,” a groundbreaking program that tackles some of Kosovo’s most controversial subjects. It is the country’s most-watched current affairs program. Her work has appeared in The Independent, The Economist, The Sunday Telegraph, and Jane’s Intelligence Review. Xharra began her career as an investigative journalist when she was 18 years old, as a fixer and interpreter for the BBC bureau in Kosovo. On her first day of work, Serbian anti-terrorist units besieged a small village outside of Pristina where the leader of the Kosovar Liberation Army lived with his family. Xharra traveled alongside the BBC team to cover the attack, in which troops killed nearly 50 villagers, including many women and children. Throughout the conflict, Xharra continued her work with the BBC and eventually became Kosovo bureau chief. After the war, Xharra studied in the United Kingdom, where she received a master’s in war studies from Kings College and a master’s with distinction in screenwriting from the London College of Printing.