A familiar voice from Radio 4's 'From Our Own Correspondent', Jonathan Fryer went straight from school to Vietnam to report freelance for the 'Manchester Evening News'. After university, he joined Reuters News Agency, which sent him to Brussels -- the start of a seven-year stint in the Capital of Europe, writing on EU affairs for a number of outlets.

Since returning to England, he has been based in London, working mainly for the BBC and the 'Guardian', as well as lecturing at London University's School of Oriental and African Studies (SOAS). He is the author of 13 non-fiction books -- mainly biographies -- some of which have been translated into French, Spanish, German, Dutch, Romanian and Hebrew. He has been a parliamentary candidate (Chelsea 1983; Orpington 1987; Leyton 1992) and Euro-parliamentary candidate (1979, 1984, 1994, 1999, 2004), narrowly failing to become London's second LibDem MEP on the last occasion. Jonathan has served on the party's Federal Policy Committee and is an elected representative on the party's International Relations Committee and the Council of ELDR. He is currently Chair of Liberal International British Group.