RIYADH Feb, 14 (INP): Dr. Fahd bin Hassan Al-Aqran was recently appointed director of the Saudi Press Agency (SPA) by the Kingdom’s acting minister of media, Dr. Majid Al-Qasabi. Al-Aqran has been a board member of the SPA — the country’s first official news agency established in 1971 — and since 2002 has held the post of editor-in-chief at the Jeddah-based Arabic daily Al-Madina. According to Arab News tgat he is a board member of Al-Madina Establishment for Press and Publishing, the printer of Al-Madina, one of the oldest newspapers in the country. He is also vice chairman of the Saudi Journalists Association and head of its executive committee. Born in 1963, Al-Aqran gained a Ph.D. in business administration, and was a board member of the GCC Advertising Association from 2002 to 2005 and the Arab Distributors’ Union from 2001 to 2004. He was secretary-general of the media committee of the 2020 G20 Riyadh summit, and as chairman of the SPA executive committee helped to draw up the news agency’s development plans in line with the goals of Vision 2030, the country’s reform program for which he heads the publicity team at the Ministry of Media. Last year, he managed the G20 media committee that successfully laid on the necessary resources and services required by foreign and local press representatives to provide news coverage for more than 135 summit meetings and conferences. Prior to that, Al-Aqran chaired the supreme media committee for the Gulf, Arab, and Islamic summits held in 2019 in Makkah. He has joined media delegations at numerous summits, visits, and conferences and has accompanied King Salman and Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman on official tours