Saleem Safi is considered a specialist in issues concerning Afghanistan, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and Pakistan's tribal areas. Saleem Safi was born in District Mardan of Khyber Pakhtoonkhwa. He did his Bachelors from the University of Peshawar. After his studies he started his career as a reporter for NNI in Mardan. Where he rose to the post of Beauru Chief of NNI in the key city of Peshawar. As Beauru Chief he was covering all of Khyber Pakhtoonkhwa, FATA and Afghanistan. He started writing columns for national newspapers. From 2000 to 2008 Saleem’s columns in Daily Mashriq, Daily Aaj and Daily Pakistan were not only widely read but widely hailed as bringing facts and in depth coverage of an emerging situation in the pre and post 9/11 scenario. Pakistani politics, foreign policy, Afghanistan and socio religious issues have all been discussed by him through his writings in more than one thousand columns. In 2004 Saleem’s first book, Afghanistan: The Role of US, Taliban and Pakistani Religious Parties. He is in the process of writing his second book. Saleem also started in electronic media following the media boom in Pakistan. He hosted his own prime time Pushto talk show, Jirga from PTV Peshawar from 2002 to 2004. Due to popular demand he again started show but on PTV World, “Saleem Safi Kay Saath” in Urdu in 2005 from Islamabad, which he hosted till 2008. From 2007 to 2008 he also hosted a talk show, “Siyasat” on the Pushto languagetv channel, Khyber. At the end of 2008, he joined Pakistan’s largest media group Jang and Geo TV as an anchor, columnist and analyst. He is currently hosting a show with the name of Jirga, and writes in the News and Jang with the same name. Saleem’s talk shows and documentaries are widely seen across the country. He has conducted hard hitting interviews of many national and international leaders and stakeholders in the region such as Nawaz Sharif, Pervez Musharraf, Asif Ali Zardari, Hamid Karzai, Fazal-ur-Rehman, Gulbadin Hikmatyar, Burhanuddin Rabbani, Abdullah Abdullah and other political, religious and jihadi leaders. Saleem is working on new initiatives to further his work.e is a pashtoon nationalist and Jamat e Islami supporter. He has hosted various current affairs programmes on TV channels such as PTV News, the Pashto-language AVT Khyber and is currently serving as the host of GEO News TV talk show Jirga. He has also written columns for the Daily Jang, an Urdu language newspaper.
Books
Saleem Safi is the author of Afghanistan: US, Taliban, Aur Pakistan Ki Deeni Juma’aton Ka Kirdar, published in 2004.
