CNN’s Frederik Pleitgen on being the only US network reporter in Iran: ‘It’s obviously a big responsibility’

Fred Pleitgen and Claudia Otto report from Tehran's Shahran oil depot on 8 March. Photograph: Courtesy of CNN

Frederik Pleitgen, CNN’s senior international correspondent, had a pretty normal Thursday evening – at home in Berlin with his family, he walked his two Rhodesian Ridgeback dogs and spent some time with his two teenagers.

That return to normalcy came after spending a week in war-torn Iran as the only western television correspondent given a visa to report from the country.