Born in Pakistan in 1978, Sharmeen Obaid-Chinoy is a journalist and a documentary filmmaker. Her first film Terror’s Children won the American Women in Radio and Television Gracie Award, the Overseas Press Club Award, and the South Asian Journalist Association Award. Her second, Re-inventing the Taliban, earned her the Banff Rockie Special Jury Award. Her third, On A Razor’s Edge, is about the recent peace movement between India and Pakistan. She is currently finishing an MA in Journalism at Stanford University.

Recent articles

After the immediate shock of the earthquake that hit the Kashmir regions of Pakistan and India, killing nearly 75,000, the approach of winter poses a second deadly threat to the survivors. Sharmeen Obaid-Chinoy sends a diary full of tragedy, despair and heroism from a Cuban medical camp in the mountains.

Sharmeen Obaid’s documentary films explore the impact of politics on ordinary people - refugees from Taliban rule in Afghanistan, Pakistani citizens affected by the rise of fundamentalism, Indian and Pakistani families separated by history. Laila Kazmi spoke to her in a telephone call to San Francisco, where her films were screening.