Anup Kaphle, an international journalist who has worked at leading publications in the United States, including The Washington Post, has taken charge of The Kathmandu Post as its Editor-in-Chief. Kaphle will additionally assume new responsibility as the head of digital transformation for all publications under the Kantipur Media Group.

Kantipur Media Group Chairman and Managing Director Kailash Sirohiya announced Kaphle’s appointment as the chief editor amid a function at the KMG office in Thapathali, Kathmandu, on Tuesday.

Kaphle, 34, has been working as an executive editor at Roads & Kingdoms, overseeing the independent digital publication’s editorial and growth strategy. Prior to that, Kaphle was the deputy foreign editor at BuzzFeed News, running its international news coverage from London. But his longest stint as a journalist was at The Washington Post, where he spent nearly six years, first as a multimedia producer and later the digital foreign editor.

Kaphle’s career has mostly involved covering foreign news for US publications, but his assignments have also brought him to Nepal several times in the last decade, covering the Maoist insurgency, migrant worker deaths, and the 2015 earthquake. Kaphle’s work, both reporting and editing, has a sharp focus on telling stories in innovative ways on digital platforms, which Kantipur Media Group has been moving to make its central strategy as it grows its online audience.

In a speech to the newsroom staff announcing Kaphle’s new role, Kantipur Media Group Chairman Kailash Sirohiya expressed his hopes that the appointment will “take the media to new heights.”

Kaphle has also been named as the Head of Digital Transformation for Kantipur Media Group, a new role with a mandate to digitise the company’s various platforms, including Kantipur Television and Radio Kantipur.

At the Post, he succeeds Akhilesh Upadhyay, who resigned last month after being at the helm of the paper for ten years.

As a reporter, Kaphle received a number of reporting fellowships, some of which brought him back to Nepal. In 2013, Kaphle travelled to Aambhanjyang in Hetauda to report on the rapidly growing number of young Nepalis who were leaving the country to work in the Gulf region, only to come back home in coffins.

Last month, Kaphle oversaw the publication of a deeply reported travel guide to Kathmandu, featuring mostly local writers from the Kathmandu Valley, on Roads & Kingdoms, a James Beard award-winning digital magazine that publishes stories at the intersection of food and politics.

“Around the world, this is a rich time to be in journalism and reporting,” said Kaphle, following the announcement about his new role. “And I want to encourage reporters and editors here to think about the rest of the country as aggressively as they do about the Capital.”

“I want to make sure The Kathmandu Post gives its readers the stories they find worthy of their time and are inclined to share,” said Kaphle.