Journalist, Columnist, Editor, Author,
Visual Storyteller

Amelia Smith is a recognised name within the human rights and global issues sector. As an author she works closely with communities facing the most serious challenges within the UK, Egypt, Palestine, Syria and the MENA region. As a columnist and an author of features, her work is frequently selected for publication by the top titles, including The Guardian, The Independent, Al Jazeera, Open Democracy, The New Arab, The Journalist. She has been translated into many languages.

Beyond her successful freelance career, Amelia is also Senior Staff Writer at the Middle East Monitor, where her work focuses on Egypt. 18 days documented the momentous toppling of long-time dictator Hosni Mubarak, weaving together testimonies, exclusive videos, photographs and illustrations.

She has interviewed scores of political prisoners, their families, and documented the insight and opinion of major political and sector leaders on the devastating effects that forcible disappearance, torture and incarceration are having on the region. 

Amelia has also conducted long-form investigations. The Million Dollar Boat Ride Across the Mediterranean documented the journey taken by Eritrean refugees detained in military camps over the border into Sudan, through the Sahara Desert and across the Mediterranean towards Europe. 

Following the death of Saudi Washington Post columnist Jamal Khashoggi, Amelia chaired his memorial in London which was broadcast live on TV channels across the world. She was one of a select few journalists who interviewed his fiancée, Hatice Cengiz, who was the last person to see Jamal alive.

She has also investigated forced evictions in Palestine in collaboration with the State Crime Initiative, the impact of Ethiopia’s Renaissance Dam on families living along the banks of the Nile River in Sudan and British investment in Egypt despite the sharp rise in human rights abuses in the country.

Amelia was the first journalist to interview Rasha Ibrahim, the sister of Rania Ibrahim, who lived on the 23rd floor of Grenfell Tower in west London who died with her two daughters in the fire that ravished the building.

Amelia has travelled extensively across the Middle East to interview key figures involved in regional upheavals. In the UK, she has been at the forefront of breaking news, including at the aftermath of Grenfell Tower Fire. She has been privileged to interview Tony Benn, Lord David Steele, Michael Mansfield QC and Thorvold Stoltenberg, among others, on an array of human rights and global issue stories.

Amelia has edited two books: ‘The Arab Spring: Five Years On’ and ‘A Chronicle of Adventure and Fraud Under the Egyptian Blockade’. She is currently working on her first novel set in Aleppo during the early days of the Syrian uprising.

In 2016 Amelia was a finalist at the Write Stuff writing competition at the London Book Fair.

She studied at Bristol University and at the University of Alexandria.