Christopher Hitchens dies after cancer battle

British-born author and journalist Christopher Hitchens has died aged 62.

Mr Hitchens had been undergoing chemotherapy after being diagnosed with cancer last year, but died with friends at his bedside at the MD Anderson Cancer Centre in Houston, Texas, Vanity Fair reported.

His death was reportedly announced in a statement from Conde Nast, publisher of Vanity Fair, where he was a contributing editor.

Vanity Fair editor Graydon Carter was reported to have said there would “never be another like Christopher”.

Mr Carter described Mr Hitchens as someone “of ferocious intellect, who was as vibrant on the page as he was at the bar”.

“Those who read him felt they knew him, and those who knew him were profoundly fortunate souls.”

English-American citizen Hitchens was a columnist and literary critic, often appearing on talk shows and giving lectures.

His memoir Hitch-22 was published last year, the same year he was diagnosed with oesophageal cancer.

An outspoken atheist, he took on former prime minister Tony Blair in a televised debate last year in Toronto, Canada, linking God to a “celestial dictatorship, a kind of divine North Korea”.

In an interview last November, he told the BBC the cancer had spread to his lymph nodes and was possibly brought on by his “bohemian and rackety life”.