PERSON: Arwa Damon

Senior International Correspondent

Arwa Damon (born September 19, 1977) is an American journalist who was most recently a senior international correspondent for CNN, based in Istanbul. From 2003, she covered the Middle East as a freelance journalist, before joining CNN in 2006. She is also president and founder of INARA, a humanitarian organization that provides medical treatment to refugee children from Syria.

Damon was born in Boston on September 19, 1977 to an American father and Syrian mother. She spent her early childhood years in Wayland, Massachusetts. Damon is the granddaughter of Muhsin al-Barazi, the former Prime Minister of Syria, who was executed in the August 1949 Syrian coup d’état.

At the age of six, Damon and her family moved to Morocco, followed by Istanbul, Turkey three years later, where her father was a teacher and middle school director at Robert College.

Damon skipped sixth grade and graduated with honors from Robert College at the age of 16. She then spent a gap year with her aunt and uncle in Morocco, learning show jumping, before moving to the U.S. to attend Skidmore College in Saratoga Springs, New York. She graduated with honors in 1999 with a major in French and a minor in international affairs.

Before becoming a reporter, Damon sold bathrobes and towels for an on-line textile company.

Damon is fluent in Arabic, French and Turkish. She lives in Istanbul with her three pet cats.

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