Roger Alton (born 20 December 1947) is a British journalist. Currently executive editor of The Times he was formerly editor of The Independent and The Observer. He was educated at Clifton College and Exeter College, Oxford. He joined the Liverpool Post on graduation moving to The Guardian five years later as a sub-editor. He was the editor of the British national Sunday newspaper The Observer from 1998 to 2007. Under his editorship, The Observer's editorial view supported the invasion of Iraq, a stance that Alton, speaking to Stephen Sackur on BBC's HARDtalk, (22 August 2008) has since admitted may have been incorrect.