Anna Fifield

She got her start writing for the Rotorua Daily Post [2] in her native New Zealand and writing for wire services. Then, in 2001 at the age of 24, she headed to London and secured a job at the Financial Times where she worked for 13 years, mainly as a foreign correspondent. She was US Political Correspondent in Washington, D.C. between 2009 and 2013, and was previously Middle East correspondent in Beirut and Tehran, and Korea Correspondent in Seoul.

She has reported from more than 20 countries, including Iran, Iraq, Syria, Libya and North Korea. She was a Nieman Fellow in Journalism (August 2013 through May 2014) at Harvard University in Cambridge, Massachusetts.[3] There, she studied how change happens in closed societies.[4] In 2018, she was awarded the Shorenstein Journalism Award from Stanford University. "Fifield exemplifies how crucial it is to get the complexities of Asia right and the profound role of journalism in shaping public and decision maker approaches to our counterparts in the region," the university said.[5]

In reporting on North Korea, she has highlighted the difficulties faced by ordinary North Koreans, especially in the Kim Jong-un era. In 2017, she interviewed more than 25 recent escapees from North Korea, producing a major report that was published in both English and Korean.[6] This was the first time The Washington Post had published in the Korean language.[7]

She wrote a story about young North Koreans who are making a new life for themselves in South Korea.[8] This was an optimistic story drawing on Fifield's encounters with young North Korean escapees and offered a different narrative from the usual portrayal of North Koreans as helpless victims.

Fifield became the first person to ever go live on Facebook from North Korea[9] in 2016.

She covered the story of deceased University of Virginia student Otto Warmbier, who was released from imprisonment in North Korea through diplomatic efforts by the Department of State in the Trump Administration.

She has also sought to show through reporting that Kim Jong Un is not a cartoon villain or a joke, but a ruthless dictator who is operating strategically, even if that strategy involves killing his own uncle and half-brother in order to stay in power.

She has interviewed numerous people who have met Kim Jong Un. She also secured the only interview with Kim Jong-un's aunt, who has been living in the United States since 1998.[10]

Fifield's book The Great Successor: The Perfectly Divine Destiny of Brilliant Comrade Kim Jong Un, was published in June 2019 by PublicAffairs in the U.S.[11] and John Murray in the U.K. According to the publisher's website, it is "the behind-the-scenes story of the rise and reign of the world’s strangest and most elusive tyrant, Kim Jong Un, by the journalist with the best connections and insights into the bizarrely dangerous world of North Korea."[12]

• 2013–2014 – Harvard University, Fellow, Nieman Foundation for Journalism
• 1997 – University of Canterbury, Post-graduate Diploma, Journalism
• 1994–1996 – Victoria University of Wellington, Bachelor of Arts, English language and literature

• Fifield, Anna. Seoul Success: These young North Korean escapees are thriving in the South.] The Washington Post, August 3, 2018
• Fifield, Anna. Life under Kim Jong Un The Washington Post, 17 November 2017
• Fifield, Anna. Kim Jong Un wants to stay in power — and that is an argument against nuclear war The Washington Post, 10 August 2017
• Fifield, Anna. North Korea's leader is a lot of things — but irrational is not one of them.] The Washington Post, March 25, 2017
• Fifield, Anna. China and US agree non-binding climate plan – Financial Times, 10 July 2013.
• Fifield, Anna, Japan's Leader Stops Short of WWII Apology], The Washington Post, 14 August 2015. (with 1:45 embedded video)
• Anna Fifield, S. Koreans Make Big Sacrifices to Study Overseas, (paper presented at the annual meeting for the Association for Asian Studies, ... 1996); Chang-sik Shin and Ian Shaw, “Social Policy in South Korea: Cultural and Structural Factors in the Emergence of Welfare" First published: 23 June 2003. doi:10.1111/1467-9515.00343

-Reprinted in: Los Angeles Times, 16 January 2006, Josh C. H. Lin (El Monte, CA: Pacific Asian Press, 1998), 95–112. in Encyclopedia of Asian American Issues Today, Volume 1, by Edith Wen-Chu Chen.

-Reprinted in: Encyclopedia of Asian American Issues Today, co-edited by Edith Wen-Chu Chen and Grace J. Yoo, 2010. Social Science.

• Fifield, Anna (2019). The Great Successor: The Secret Rise and Rule of Kim Jong Un. London: John Murray Press. ISBN 978-1-5293-8724-7.

• Washington Post profile for Anna Fifield
• The Foreign Correspondents Club of Japan profile for Anna Fifield
• PSCP TV video broadcasts from Anna Fifield
• Washington Post reporter goes live on Facebook from North Korea