Greg Sheridan

Early life

He grew up in Sydney, attending Macquarie University and the University of Sydney but did not graduate though his previous biography submitted to ABC's Q&A as a panelist claimed he earned a Bachelor of Arts from the University of Sydney in 1977 At university, Sheridan was a close personal friend to Tony Abbott; the two attended the Australian Union of Students annual conference in Melbourne together, in 1977.

Career

Sheridan first worked at The Bulletin magazine in 1979. His reporting on the Vietnamese boat people, subsequent to the end of the Vietnam War, sparked a lifelong interest in Asian politics.

Sheridan joined The Australian in 1984. He worked in Beijing, Washington, and Canberra before starting his tenure as foreign editor in 1992. Writing on and from the Asian region since the 1980s, he specialises on Asian politics, and has written four books on the topic, plus a book on Australia-U.S. relationships. He is a Distinguished Fellow of the Australia India Institute at the University of Melbourne.

Commentary

Sheridan has been a staunch supporter of closer ties between Australia and its Southeast Asian neighbours, particularly Singapore and Indonesia. In his book Hidden Agendas, journalist and Sheridan critic John Pilger accuses him of being a "reliable ally" of the Suharto dictatorship while serving as the foreign editor of The Australian. In particular, Pilger derided Sheridan's defense of Indonesia following the Clinton administration's critique of Suharto's human rights records, as well as the Australian Parliament's Foreign Affairs Committee following its confirmation of the Santa Cruz Massacre. Sheridan stated that "even genuine victims frequently concoct stories".

He had been a vocal critic of Prime Minister John Howard's intervention in East Timor in 1999, and during 2006 called for the removal of Mari Alkatiri as Prime Minister of that country.

Sheridan has been a supporter of the Australian government's anti-terror legislation and argues the deportation from Australia of American environmental activist Scott Parkin was well founded. He has also argued in support of the notion that George W. Bush will be judged "one of the great presidents of the United States".

In reference to the 2011 Egyptian protests, Sheridan wrote that "What is happening in Egypt and across Arab North Africa more generally represents a distinct new phase in the existential crisis of Arab civilisation."

Personal life

Although originally from Sydney, Sheridan moved to Melbourne in 2006. He is married to Jasbir Kaur "Jessie" Sheridan; the couple have three sons.