Gaus was born in
Munich in December 1956, the daughter of Erika Gaus and publicist and diplomat
Günter Gaus. She attended the
Deutsche Journalistenschule in Munich and studied
political science at the
Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität München there. In 1979 she completed an
internship at the
Hamburger Morgenpost, after which she worked for the Munich
Abendzeitung, among others. From 1983 to 1989 she was political editor at the German-language program of
Deutsche Welle. From 1989 to 1996, she reported out of
Nairobi on Africa topics for the
tageszeitung (taz),
ARD stations and news agencies. From 1996 to 1999 Gaus headed the parliamentary office of the
taz, since then she had been the political correspondent of the newspaper until 2021. Since 2021, she had been writing
columns for the magazine
Der Spiegel. She died in
Berlin on 27 October 2021, at the age of 64. She leaves behind a daughter, Nora Mbagathi, born to Bettina Gaus and Stanley Mbagathi in Cologne in 1987. ==Publications==