Jonathan Mann (born July 16, 1960) is a retired Canadian journalist. For 30 years he worked for

CNN International CNN International (CNNI, simply branded on-air as CNN) is an international television channel that is owned by CNN Global. CNN International carries news-related programming worldwide; it cooperates with sister network CNN's national and inte ...

. He also worked for ''La Presse''. During the presidency of

Barack Obama Barack Hussein Obama II ( ; born August 4, 1961) is an American politician who served as the 44th president of the United States from 2009 to 2017. A member of the Democratic Party, Obama was the first African-American president of the ...

, he hosted ''Political Mann'' on CNN. Every December, Mann hosts ''The Prize for Peace'', a discussion with the

Nobel Peace Prize The Nobel Peace Prize is one of the five Nobel Prizes established by the will of Swedish industrialist, inventor and armaments (military weapons and equipment) manufacturer Alfred Nobel, along with the prizes in Chemistry, Physics, Physiolog ...

winner, live from

Oslo Oslo ( , , or ; sma, Oslove) is the capital and most populous city of Norway. It constitutes both a county and a municipality. The municipality of Oslo had a population of in 2022, while the city's greater urban area had a population ...

Norway Norway, officially the Kingdom of Norway, is a Nordic country in Northern Europe, the mainland territory of which comprises the western and northernmost portion of the Scandinavian Peninsula. The remote Arctic island of Jan Mayen and the ...

Biography

Mann was born in

Montreal Montreal ( ; officially Montréal, ) is the second-most populous city in Canada and most populous city in the Canadian province of Quebec. Founded in 1642 as '' Ville-Marie'', or "City of Mary", it is named after Mount Royal, the triple ...

Quebec Quebec ( ; )According to the Canadian government, ''Québec'' (with the acute accent) is the official name in Canadian French and ''Quebec'' (without the accent) is the province's official name in Canadian English is one of the thirtee ...

, Canada, to Adina and Harry Mann. His mother was a travel agent and his father a general practitioner and amateur actor. He received his primary school education at the Jewish People's School, where he also learned

Hebrew Hebrew (; ; ) is a Northwest Semitic language of the Afroasiatic language family. Historically, it is one of the spoken languages of the Israelites and their longest-surviving descendants, the Jews and Samaritans. It was largely preserved ...

and

Yiddish Yiddish (, or , ''yidish'' or ''idish'', , ; , ''Yidish-Taytsh'', ) is a West Germanic language historically spoken by Ashkenazi Jews. It originated during the 9th century in Central Europe, providing the nascent Ashkenazi community with a ve ...

. Mann received a bachelor's degree in philosophy from

York University York University (french: Université York), also known as YorkU or simply YU, is a public university, public research university in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. It is Canada's fourth-largest university, and it has approximately 55,700 students, 7,0 ...

Toronto Toronto ( ; or ) is the capital city of the Canadian province of Ontario. With a recorded population of 2,794,356 in 2021, it is the most populous city in Canada and the fourth most populous city in North America. The city is the anch ...

, Ontario. Early in his career, he worked as a freelance journalist in India covering the aftermath of the assassination of Indira Gandhi in 1984. He captured Canadian and international headlines when, defying a ban imposed on foreigners in the state of

Punjab Punjab (; Punjabi: پنجاب ; ਪੰਜਾਬ ; ; also romanised as ''Panjāb'' or ''Panj-Āb'') is a geopolitical, cultural, and historical region in South Asia, specifically in the northern part of the Indian subcontinent, comprising a ...

, he was arrested and placed in police custody in the city of Amritsar. Upon receiving the news, his parents travelled to Ottawa to lobby Canada's federal government to intervene on his behalf. The incident received widespread media coverage and was even debated during

question period Question Period (french: période des questions), known officially as Oral Questions (french: questions orales) occurs each sitting day in the House of Commons of Canada, in which members of the parliament ask questions of government ministers (i ...

in the

House of Commons The House of Commons is the name for the elected lower house of the bicameral parliaments of the United Kingdom and Canada. In both of these countries, the Commons holds much more legislative power than the nominally upper house of parliament. T ...

. Thanks largely to a concerted diplomatic effort by the Canadian government, Mann was released one week later. The attention drawn to Mann during the affair is credited with helping launch his successful journalistic career, leading to work with the

CBC Radio CBC Radio is the English-language radio operations of the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation. The CBC operates a number of radio networks serving different audiences and programming niches, all of which (regardless of language) are outlined below ...

, NBC Radio, and later

CNN CNN (Cable News Network) is a multinational cable news channel headquartered in Atlanta, Georgia, U.S. Founded in 1980 by American media proprietor Ted Turner and Reese Schonfeld as a 24-hour cable news channel, and presently owned by ...

, where he became the 24-hour news network's first Paris correspondent. As a Montreal native, he speaks fluent French.

References

External links

* https://twitter.com/jonmannexanchor?lang=en {{DEFAULTSORT:Mann, Jonathan 1960 births Living people Journalists from Montreal Jewish Canadian journalists Canadian television journalists CNN people Anglophone Quebec people Yiddish-speaking people York University alumni

Biography

References

Further reading

External links