Vanessa Burggraf will take charge of all France 24 channels (in French, Arabic, English, and Spanish) on June 8 and will join the executive committee of France Médias Monde.
Her mission will be to continue the work accomplished by all the teams over the past few years, which has enabled France 24 to establish itself in the global audiovisual landscape by affirming the expert, independent and authoritative nature of its news coverage on all continents.
Vanessa Burggraf succeeds Marc Saikali, who, in agreement with the management of France Médias Monde, has decided to leave to pursue personal projects.
Marc Saiklai had been at the helm of France 24 for more than eight and a half years, during which time the channel's audience more than doubled to reach over 100 million weekly viewers in 2020. During this period, the channel also experienced exponential growth in the digital sphere.
Vanessa Burggraf has been a journalist at France 24 since the channel was created in 2006. With a master's degree in modern literature and a postgraduate degree in political and social communication from Paris I Sorbonne University, she began her career as a reporter for the program "Thé ou café" presented by Catherine Ceylac on France 2. After working for M6 and Euronews, she joined the editorial team at Bloomberg TV in London, where she presented economic news programs. In 2001, she returned to Paris to work for TV5Monde as a reporter and presenter of news programs and special editions. She joined France 24 in 2006, where she presented news programs, then in 2012 the "Paris Direct" slot from 6 to 8 p.m., including "Le Débat," for which she was editor-in-chief. During the 2016/2017 season, she joined the France 2 program "On n'est pas couché," presented by Laurent Ruquier, as a columnist. She returned to France 24 in the summer of 2017 as deputy director in charge of the French-language channel.