Christina Goldbaum

I am the Afghanistan and Pakistan bureau chief for The New York Times, leading the coverage of the region.

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What I Cover

I cover Afghanistan and Pakistan, writing about the politics, economics, culture and conflicts shaping this part of the world. One of the best parts of my beat is traveling across both countries to report stories, meet people and see what is unfolding first hand. I’ve ridden along with smugglers as they snuck migrants across Afghanistan’s border with Iran, embedded with rebels leading an uprising against the Taliban and traveled by boat to talk to people stranded in villages-turned-islands during record-breaking floods in Pakistan. I’m often writing about politics, economics and the news of the day in the region. But my favorite stories are the unusual, surprising and personal tales that challenge our preconceptions about a place.

My Background

I joined The Times in 2018 in the New York headquarters, and joined the Kabul bureau in 2021, just weeks before the Taliban seized power. Before that, I was a freelance foreign correspondent based in Nairobi, Kenya, writing for outlets including Foreign Policy, The Atlantic, the Daily Beast and the Economist. I traveled across East Africa reporting on everything from conflicts and climate change to music and culture. I also spent more than a year living in Mogadishu, Somalia, where my reporting exposed civilian casualties from U.S. military operations across the country.

I was awarded The Livingston Award for International Reporting, the National Press Club’s Edwin M. Hood Award for Diplomatic Correspondence and the Frontline Club’s Print Journalism Award for my work in Somalia. I’ve also been part of reporting teams that won an Overseas Press Club award in 2022 and a Loeb award in 2021. I graduated from Tufts University and grew up in Bethesda, Maryland.

Journalistic Ethics

Journalistic independence is essential to my work, and as a Times journalist I adhere to the standards of integrity outlined in The Times’s Ethical Journalism handbook. I strive for fairness, accuracy and empathy when I set out to report and to always maintain an open mind. That means questioning my own biases and assumptions, talking to people with a wide range of perspectives and treating everyone I interview with respect and honesty.

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