Alan joined Al Jazeera (English) from GMTV, Europe's most watched breakfast programme, where for the last six years he was Chief Correspondent.

During that time he covered the war in Bosnia, reporting on the end of the siege of Sarajevo and the huge humanitarian crisis caused by the bloody Rwandan civil war. He also reported from Baghdad during the UK/US air strikes in 1998, from Paris in the aftermath of the death of Diana, Princess of Wales, spent ten weeks in Baghdad in the run up to the last Gulf War, covered the Bali bombing and presented a three-part series on poverty in Africa as well as covering major stories in the UK including the bomb attacks on London's transport system.

At the last count, Alan has reported from more than forty countries around the world and has a wealth of international news experience. He has also been much in demand to speak at and chair conferences. He has addressed a high level Cabinet Office training course on the role of the media and recently chaired and was a keynote speaker at a major international conference on terrorism and communication. He has also been widely praised for his role of chairman at a number of conferences organised by the Dutch Government. Obviously, he can speak at length about Al Jazeera and its place in the changing media world.

Alan is a weekly columnist in the Scottish Review, the on-line magazine for the Institute of Contemporary Scotland, an organisation determined to fight ‘dumbing down’.

In recent years Alan has become a keen cyclist, raising more than £10,000 for the British Heart Foundation. He collects books on journalism and has also appeared in an episode of the TV prison drama, Bad Girls, playing… a television reporter.