The Queen's College Record 2023

Obituaries
Gareth left Queen’s for an MPhil at the University of Kent in Canterbury and worked
as a supply teacher for several years. He then became an elected (Labour) councillor,
and housing chair, for Camden council, and subsequently research assistant to Stan
Newens, MEP, in 1990, and a Labour party press officer. He transitioned to freelance
journalist and, in 1992 covered the Kurdish elections in northern Iraq for the Financial
Times. He reported in 1993 on treks in western Iran with Peshmerga guerrillas of the
Kurdistan Democratic Party of Iran, which led to positions of Opinion and Features
Editor of the Daily Star in Beirut and Lebanon correspondent for the FT. In 2003,
while covering the invasion and occupation of Iraq for the FT, he was appointed chief
Iran correspondent, based in Tehran.
Gareth’s independent spirit was never comfortable in an institutional setting,
however, and in 2009, he relocated to Emlagh, on the west coast of Ireland. Here,
he combined freelance journalism with his love of the land, nature, and the seasons.
His study was crammed with books; his garden a testimony to sustainable living.
During his career, he interviewed countless people, from Tony Blair, Martin
McGuiness to Rafiq al-Hariri. In 2005-06, he was nominated as Foreign
Correspondent of the Year in the British Press Awards. More recently, he was
ghostwriter for Saad al-Barrak’s Passion for Adventure (Bloomsbury 2012) and had
been editing and annotating a posthumous book in English of Imam Musa Sadr’s
politico-theological writings.
Deeply influenced by his family’s Republican Irish background, Gareth always refused
to conform to a world increasingly defined by binary views. He believed the training
he received at Queen’s had a profound impact in helping to stay calm in difficult
circumstances. As he would say: once you had defended your essay on Wittgenstein
in front of Brian McGuinness, an exchange with your Chief Editor or an Iranian
Revolutionary Guard held no fears.
His deeply ingrained, natural humanity meant, wherever he was, he immersed himself
in local culture, engaging with people from all walks of life – the barber, the café-owner,
the football player – as well as musicians, writers, and artists. He tried to represent all
views – including, in Tehran, those of the Iran Government. He saw the grey areas,
the nuances often missed, and reported on perspectives that are not commonly
understood. He experienced, first-hand, the horrific and lasting legacy of conflict, and
was with George Bernard Shaw: “War doesn’t determine who is right, but who is left”.
He was much more than a political journalist though. His tastes were wide-ranging:
Bob Marley to Gustav Mahler to Chateau Musar; Myles na gCopaleen to Miles
Davies. He had many interests: cooking with quality, often home-grown, ingredients;
Gaelic and association football; photography; and music, which played from
dawn to midnight in his cottage. He could write about them all with passion and
deep knowledge.
120 The Queen’s College | College Record 2023