A graduate of the School of Oriental and African Studies (BA Arabic and Persian), Alex Strick van Linschoten first came to Afghanistan six years ago as a tourist, travelling to 28 provinces to learn about the country and improve his Dari and Pashtu language skills.
While in London he worked with Afghan refugees at the Afghan Association of London for a year prior to coming out to Afghanistan for the first time. And in Damascus, Alex worked as a liaison
between various Iraqi NGOs based in Syria and their international donors.
In 2006, he founded AfghanWire.com together with Felix Kuehn. The organisation seeks to improve awareness of the wide range of issues and opinions relating to Afghanistan through a newsletter and informational database, both available free to the general public and scholar/policy-maker alike.
Currently,Alex is working on three separate projects: a book and PhD at the War Studies
Department of King's College London on the interactions between Sufi groups and militant jihadi organisations in Iraq, Afghanistan and Chechnya; as co-editor of two books written by former Taliban envoy to Pakistan, Mullah Abdul Salam Zaeef, due for publication in September 2009 and January 2010 respectively; and an expansive history of southern Afghanistan 1970-2001.
He worked as an Arabic translator for Mideastwire.com, an Arabic-language media-monitor for the
Arab world and has worked as a freelance journalist from Afghanistan, Syria, Lebanon, and Somalia. He speaks Arabic, Farsi, Pashtu, and German and can get by in French and Dutch.
Alex lives permanently in Kandahar, Afghanistan.
