Ash-har Quraishi
- Producer
Ash-har Quraishi is an Emmy Award-winning television journalist, writer
and filmmaker with more than a decade of local, international, and
investigative reporting experience. He is currently a joint
Correspondent for WTTW (PBS Chicago) where he reports for their
flagship nightly news magazine show Chicago Tonight and the Chicago
News Cooperative where he writes for their website and provides print
and online content focused on Chicago for the New York Times. Quraishi
is currently working on completing a feature-length documentary about
the Arab-American experience in Dearborn, Michigan post 9/11. The film
follows Fordson High School's predominantly Arab/Muslim-American
football team for the last ten days of their holy month of Ramadan as
they practice and play football while fasting. The film is a
co-production of North Shore Films and Quraishi Productions, LLC the
company he co-founded with his partner/producer and wife Basma
Babar-Quraishi. "Fordson" is Quraishi Productions' maiden venture into
feature-length documentary filmmaking. Quraishi served as a producer on
the film and also wrote and photographed portions of the documentary.
The film will premiere at the Slamdance Film Festival in Park City,
Utah in January 2011. Before his posting in Chicago Quraishi spent four
years working as the Chief Investigative Reporter for KCTV, the CBS
affiliate in Kansas City. His investigative reports there exposed
corruption, imprisoned criminals and prompted change in city and state
government. A bold investigation into lax airline passenger screening
procedures resulted in a federal probe by the Department of Homeland
Security and was recognized with a 2009 Regional Edward R. Murrow Award
for Investigative Reporting and a Heart of America Award from the
Kansas City Press Club. In 2008 he co-hosted election specials from
Washington D.C. focused on bilateral relations between the United
States and Pakistan for GEO Television - a joint production with
America Abroad Media. His reporting has been featured in the New York
Times, The PBS NewsHour, The Oprah Winfrey Show and CNN. Prior to KCTV,
Quraishi spent more than six years working at CNN. He served as CNN's
Islamabad bureau chief/correspondent, responsible for the network's
coverage of Pakistan beginning just days after the 9/11 attacks.
Quraishi reported extensively on major events in Pakistan and the
region, including the Agra Summit, the ongoing conflict between nuclear
neighbors India and Pakistan, the floods in Eastern India, the hunt for
Osama bin Laden, the religious extremist movement in Pakistan and the
clashes along the Line of Control in the disputed region of Kashmir. He
reported live from Karachi on the disappearance of Wall Street Journal
reporter Daniel Pearl and the bombing of the Protestant International
Church in Islamabad. Additionally, he provided live coverage of the
first general elections in Pakistan since the 1999 military coup and
reported on the lead up to polling day in an award-winning five-part
series. Quraishi was the first television correspondent to report the
capture of top Al Qaeda operative and 9/11 architect Khalid Shaikh
Mohammad in Rawalpindi, Pakistan. He was live from the capital as the
story unfolded and conducted an exclusive one-on-one interview with
Pakistan's President General Pervez Musharraf following the arrest.
Under his leadership the CNN Islamabad bureau became the model for
CNN's new digital newsgathering system. Combining videophone
technology, compact video cameras and non-linear editing on laptop
computers - Quraishi's bureau was the first to produce news using the
cutting-edge digital platform. Before his posting in Pakistan, Quraishi
was based in Atlanta where he worked in various capacities. He
supervised production of the network's premiere long form news program
"CNN&TIME" overseeing all aspects of production. He worked as a
producer for CNN USA and was instrumental in the launch of CNN's
web-based newscast, CNN Quickcast. Prior to working for CNN, Quraishi
reported and produced for WGEM - the NBC affiliate in Quincy, IL. His
work has been honored with numerous awards from the Radio Television
Digital News Association, Investigative Reporters & Editors, The
Society of Professional Journalists, the National Academy of Television
Arts & Sciences, the Press Club of Atlantic City and the South Asian
Journalists Association. In 2010 Quraishi was awarded two National
Headliner Awards and was an IRE Award finalist. He is a four-time Emmy
Award winner and has received five Edward R. Murrow Awards. In 2004
Triangle Media Group named him one of the top 50 South Asian Global
Achievers in Mass Media.