Anneclaire Stapleton

About

AnneClaire Stapleton is an award-winning Senior International conflict journalist with over 16 years of expertise at CNN, driving impactful storytelling and leading diverse teams in high-stakes environments. Proficient in cross-platform content creation, strategic planning, and crisis management, ensuring high editorial standards and audience engagement. Passionate about innovative journalism, dedicated to elevating voices affected by conflict and disaster. Stapleton has deployed to many breaking news stories in the US and worldwide during her career, including multiple trips to the frontlines of Ukraine after the Russian invasion. She produced an exclusive interview with Ukraine's Minister of Defense in Brussels. She was one of the first international reporting teams to cover the displaced persons' crisis at Ukraine's border with Poland soon after Russia invaded Ukraine. Her team gained exclusive access to a top-secret evacuation of terminally ill Ukrainian children by train and reported as the first humanitarian buses arrived with civilians from Russian-occupied Mariupol.Stapleton managed CNN breaking news coverage during the 2021 Haitian earthquake, and US troop pull out of Afghanistan. She was the first journalist to speak with US citizen Paul Whelan's family after his arrest in Russia on espionage charges.Before joining CNN International, Stapleton covered breaking news and US-based stories for CNN. Stapleton led the reporting teams dedicated to profiling the victims of the 2015 Paris terror attack, the 2016 Pulse Nightclub shooting, the Brussels terror attack, and the victims of MH17 shot down over Ukraine, etc.Stapleton reported on the sexual assault of elite gymnasts at the hands of Larry Nassar, nationwide Jewish center bomb threats, US Marines nude photo scandal, Kabul university attack, unrest in Ferguson after a police officer killed unarmed African-American teen Michael Brown, ISIS's brutal killing of journalists, and many more. Stapleton has covered catastrophic weather events, including Hurricanes, Tropical Storms, deadly tornadoes, blizzards, typhoons, earthquakes, avalanches, and floods.Stapleton and her colleagues won a 2023 duPont-Columbia Award and multiple Emmys for CNN's coverage of the Russian invasion of Ukraine and October 7th attack in Israel. Stapleton and her colleagues won an Overseas Press Club of America David Kaplan award for CNN's coverage of the Israel/Hamas war in Gaza. She is deeply committed to reporting on the trials and tribulations of US military families and global affairs.