Skip to content Skip to Search
Skip navigation

BBC News controller heads for Saudi’s Al Arabiya News

Ex-BBC editor Jamie Angus is understood to be taking a key media role in Saudi

A former senior news editor at the BBC left the corporation to take a position at Saudi Arabia’s state broadcaster.

Jamie Angus stepped down from his role as BBC News’s senior controller of output and commissioning in April. He is expected to take a senior role at Al Arabiya News. 

Sources were uncertain about Angus’s exact position, but it is thought he could become the station’s chief financial officer or chief operating officer.

His decision has raised eyebrows at the BBC because of Saudi Arabia’s human rights record.

Angus is said to have told BBC colleagues that Al Arabiya is aiming to establish itself as one of the most innovative news operations in the world.

Al Arabiya, an Arabic-language channel, was started in 2003 and is considered a rival to Qatar’s Al Jazeera. The service is based in Dubai but started to move staff to Riyadh last September.

Angus worked at the BBC for more than two decades, which included a four-year spell as the editor of Radio 4’s Today. He was also a deputy editor on BBC2’s Newsnight and led the World Service for three years. World Service houses BBC News Arabic, so he has experience of news in the Middle East.

Angus and Al Arabiya News have not yet commented.

Latest articles

SoftBank CEO Masayoshi Son, Oracle co-founder Larry Ellison and OpenAI CEO Sam Altman listen to Donald Trump talking about the Stargate project at the White House

Gulf has a strong hand in Trump’s $500bn AI project

Two of the three tech giants that President Donald Trump said Tuesday will partner up to build billions of dollars worth of artificial-intelligence (AI) infrastructure in the US have been recipients of significant Gulf investments. Japan’s Softbank and US companies OpenAI and Oracle committed $500 billion over four years to Stargate, a new entity tasked […]

Pakistan aims to boost its finances after securing a $7bn IMF bailout in September 2024

Pakistan agrees to $1bn loan from Middle Eastern banks

Pakistan has agreed terms for a $1 billion loan with two Middle Eastern banks at a 6-7 percent interest rate, its finance minister Muhammad Aurangzeb told Reuters on Tuesday, as the South Asian country searches for more financing. “With two institutions we have now gone forward in signing up the term sheet – one bilateral […]

European Commission president Ursula von der Leyen and Egyptian president Abdel Fattah El Sisi met in Cairo in December 2024

Egypt targets €4bn EU funding by June

Egypt is aiming to strike a deal with the European Union (EU) to secure €4 billion ($4.2 billion) in financing to back its current reform agenda, according to a media report. Cairo has started negotiations with the EU, with the funds directed towards budget support and not specific projects, Asharq Business reported, quoting minister of […]

Clothing, Footwear, Shoe

Fertiglobe’s $1bn blue ammonia bet hinges on Asia

Abu Dhabi-listed Fertiglobe will invest $1 billion in expanding its blue ammonia plant capacity if Asian countries commit to buying. The final decision on the investment depends on securing contracts from Japan and South Korea, who have plans to subsidise imports of the blue ammonia, CEO Ahmed El-Hoshy told Bloomberg. The capacity building will take through […]