Karl Schembri
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Karl Schembri (born in 1978 in Malta) is a Maltese author, journalist[1] and humanitarian. Schembri also occupied the post of News Editor and Deputy Editor at Malta Today.[2] He started working in journalism with In-Nazzjon and Il-Mument in 1995, moving on to Bay Radio, The Malta Independent, The Malta Independent on Sunday and Malta Today. He left Malta in 2009 to join the Palestinian news agency Ramattan in the occupied Palestinian territory.
Schembri's investigative journalism led to the clampdown on the trading of ancient Mesopotamian artefacts from Iraq on eBay via Malta, the first ever exposure of rampant child rape by Catholic priests in a children's institution,[3] fraudulent faith healers, and the serious security lapses at Malta's world heritage and fine arts museums from where priceless pieces have been stolen. In an April 2006 investigation, Schembri revealed internal armed forces communications logs showing that Maltese army rescuers were given orders to “keep at a distance” from a boat carrying 200 migrants in gale-force winds, hours before 9 of them drowned and at least 20 went missing in a shipwreck off the coast of Sicily.[4]
He has reported extensively from Libya, Kosovo, Albania, and the Occupied Palestinian Territories, and won the 2000 Malta press award for his reporting. He also contributes to The Sunday Telegraph, Russian Newsweek and The Guardian Weekly and is the founding chairman of The Journalists' Committee.
In 2009, Schembri joined Palestinian news agency Ramattan as their English service editor, first in Ramallah and then in the Gaza Strip, where he lived for four years before moving to Jordan.
Over the past years, Schembri has been based in the Middle East working as a media adviser with humanitarian organisations including Oxfam, the Norwegian Refugee Council and Save the Children.[5] He has covered humanitarian crises in the region in Yemen, Syria, Palestine and Iraq, as well as the Syrian refugee crisis in Jordan and Lebanon.
