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People & Places
Sky News correspondent Alex Crawford, the winner of the Shifa Gardi Award, in her video acceptance speech. Photo: Rudaw
ERBIL, Kurdistan Region — Sky News correspondent Alex Crawford won Rudaw Media Network's annual Shifa Gardi Award on Thursday, “for outstanding investigative work over the year.”
This year, due to the COVID-19 pandemic, the award committee chose to host the ceremony virtually, in an effort to adhere to public health regulations.
“I think the email that I got telling me about this award was probably one of the best things that happened to me all year,” Crawford said in her award acceptance speech.
“It is becoming more and more difficult for all journalists across the world to operate, not only in the midst of pandemic, when many countries, many with autocratic leaders or dictators are using the pandemic as a way of controlling independent journalism, as a way of trying to stifle free speech, as a way of trying to clamp down on transparency,” she said.
“It is incumbent on all of us, on all journalists, to try and fight, keep on fighting against those restrictions so that the stories that need to be told continue to be told.”
The award honors the memory of Rudaw journalist and news anchor Shifa Gardi, who was killed in Mosul while covering the carnage of the Islamic State (ISIS) on February 25, 2017. The members of the jury that selected the winner were Rudaw Media Network CEO Ako Mohammed, founder and CEO of DMA Media Rob Beynon, and Adrian Wells, the managing director of global TV broadcaster associaition ENEX.
During Thursday’s virtual event, several journalists spoke in memory of Gardi.
"She had the talent, she also had the drive, she wanted to make the best out of her talent," said Adrian Smith, the head of editorial at news consultancy team DMA media, in a message for the ceremony. "She is a great loss to Rudaw, to her friends and family, but also to journalism in the region."
"This is Shifa's legacy, we dedicate this award to that effort like Shifa to inspire journalists around the world to dig for those difficult stories and speak truth to power, and throw some light into those darkest corners," said Tina Millman, DMA Media's Launch Director.
At the end of her acceptance speech, Crawford said she would be donating her award money to three different organizations – Yemeni human rights organization Mwatana, Lebanese medical aid charity INARA , and the Marie Colvin Memorial Foundation, a press freedom organization.
The year 2020 proved particularly dangerous for journalists across the globe. The United Nations documented the killings of 62 journalists worldwide last year.
Most of the journalist deaths in 2020 that press freedom organization Reporters without Borders documented were in countries that were at peace.
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