The Amnesty International UK Media Awards, sponsored by Pci: Live, recognise excellence in human rights reporting and acknowledge the significant contribution made to the UK public’s awareness and understanding of human rights issues.
Amnesty International UK Director Kate Allen said:
“With a record number of over 200 entries this year the role of the media in shining a light on human rights abuses cannot be overstated. News reports and features give a voice to those who are often unheard and frequently prompt governments or the international community to act. For all those whose lives have been affected it is essential that these stories remain in the mainstream media.†The shortlisted entries are:
Shortlist: National Newspapers
The People The Law Forgot, James Meek, The Guardian (Guantanamo Bay)
Mapped – The Lethal Legacy of Cluster Bombs, Ann Treneman, The Times (Basra)
Democratic Republic of Congo, Declan Walsh, The Independent
Judges: George Alagiah, Shami Chakrabati, Bill Emmott, Ekow Eshun, Rosemary Hollis, Maggie Paterson
Shortlist: Photojournalism
Children's rights of Bosnian Rape Victims, Ann Doherty, Sunday Times Magazine
Ghosts of the Apocalypse, Philip Blenkinsop, Sunday Times Magazine (Hmong tribe in Laos)
City Of Widows, Kalpesh Lathigra, The Herald Magazine (West Bengal)
Salvation is cheap, Gideon Mendel, Guardian Weekend (Aids in Africa)
Judges: Neil Burgess, Liz Grogan, Liz Jobey, Maggie Paterson, Mark Sealy, Aiden Sullivan,
Shortlist: Periodicals
See No Evil - Bosnian Rape Children's rights, Christine Toomey, Sunday Times Magazine
Murder In Mexico, Ed Vulliamy, The Observer Magazine (Women's rights's rightss rights's rights's rights's rights’s deaths in Ciudad Juarez)
The Bitterest Betrayal, Vikram Dodd and Tania Branigan, Guardian Weekend Magazine (Guantanamo Bay)
Judges: Fadia Faqir, Isabel Hilton, Darcus Howe, Jennifer Langer, Michael Mansfield, Maggie Paterson
Shortlist: Radio
Bush’s Other War, Reporter: Nadene Ghouri, Producer: Kirsten Lass, Editor: Stewart Lansey, BBC Radio Five Live Report (the global ‘gag’ rule)
Romania, Reporter: Jenny Cuffe, Editor: David Ross, Producer: Andy Denwood, BBC Radio 4 File on Four (orphanages, psychiatric hospitals)
India, Presenter: Lucy Ash, Producer: Giselle Portenier, Editor: Hugh Levenson, BBC Radio 4 Crossing Continents (dowry deaths)
Judges: Samira Ahmed, Jeremy Hardy, Sue McGregor, Libby Purves, Lesley Warner
Shortlist: TV Documentary
Behind the Fence, Producer/Director: Inigo Gilmore, BBC (Israel-Occupied Territories),
Access to Evil, Producer/Director: Ewa Ewart, Writer: Olenka Frenkiel, Executive Producer: Fiona Stourton, BBC This World – (North Korea)
Dowry Cops, Reporter: Adam Mynott, Producer/Director: Frank Smith, Editor: Karen O’Connor, BBC (India)
Judges: Anton Antonowicz, Nick Danziger, Roger Graef, Ken Loach, Charlotte Moore, Lesley Warner
Shortlist: TV News
Congo, Correspondent: Fergal Keane, Cameraman: Glenn Middleton, Producer: Jackie Martens, BBC Ten O’Clock News
Uganda Children's rights, Reporter: Hilary Andersson, Producer: Jackie Martens, BBC Four
Equatorial Guinea, Director: Lindsey Hilsum, Channel 4 News
Judges: Yasmin Alibhai-Brown, Maggie Brown, Nick Clarke, Moira Stewart, Lesley Warner
Shortlist: Gaby Rado Memorial Award (for a journalist at the start of their career)
James Astill, Congo’s War: The World’s Biggest, for BBC Newsnight; and UN Troops wait behind razor wire as Congo’s streets run with blood? And Bunia: A massacre foretold? in The Guardian and The Observer
James Walsh, Asylum stories: a series on the holocaust, Pakistani and Algerian asylum seekers in the Clydebank Post
Tim Samuels, Ulster Racism, for BBC TV News
Jon Manel, Guantanamo Bay for BBC Radio 4 Broadcasting House and BBC Radio 4 PM and Report from New York on thousands of Pakistanis fleeing the United States for BBC Radio 4 Broadcasting House
Judges: Andrew MacDonald, Martha Kearney, Melanie McFadyean, Dr Richard Tait, Lesley Warner
The winners of two international awards will also be announced on 13 May:
The Global Award for Human Rights Journalism which recognises excellence in human rights journalism in the written media anywhere in the world.
Judges: Tim Karr, Madan Mohan Rao, Nawal El Saadawi, Milverton Wallace, Beatrice Mtetwa
The Special Award for Human Rights Journalism Under Threat, made every year to a journalist from anywhere in the world who is putting themselves at risk by reporting on the human rights situation in their own country.
