IWMF Courage Award winner Iryna Khalip Tells World Her Jailed Husband Seeks Pardon in Belarus
Jailed Belarus presidential candidate Andrei Sannikov told his wife Iryna Khalip that he is seeking a pardon from the country’s authoritarian leader because he fears for his life.
“They could kill me at any moment,” he told Khalip – IWMF’s Courage in Journalism Award winner – when she was finally allowed to visit him this week
Khalip, 44, an investigative reporter for Novaya Gazeta, told reporters Wednesday about her two-hour visit at the penal colony Vitsba-3, where her husband has been in isolation for three months. Sannikov’s mother accompanied her. Belarus officials had refused to allow Khalip or lawyers to visit Sannikov for three months.
“I have to fight for the liberation of my husband and other political prisoners,” she told the IWMF. “I know exactly how the KGB tries to break people and it’s really torture.”
It’s been a heartbreaking year for Khalip and Sannikov, an opposition presidential candidate held in isolation in a penal colony for protesting the widely criticized election in December 2010. He and Khalip were arrested for organizing and inciting “riots,” and Belarus officials threatened to take custody of Danila.
For weeks Khalip was jailed, then held under house arrest with KGB guards around the clock watching her in their Minsk apartment. She was given a two-year suspended sentence, and she remains under tight government scrutiny with 10 p.m. curfews and mandatory weekly visits to the police station.
Their 4-year-old son recently discovered that his father was in prison, after months of asking when he would return home. “One day he was playing with the buttons clicked on the computer and there was a photo of Andrei behind bars on Charter 97 website,” Khalip told the IWMF. “He said, ‘Momma, now I know our Daddy is in prison. I guess that’s why he didn’t come back home.’ ”
“I had to explain to Danila that in our country heroes can be in prisons, while criminals can be in power,” Khalip said. “He is like a child of war after World War II, when little boys thought like adults and grew up early.”
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Nominations Open For IWMF's 2012 Courage in Journalism, Lifetime Achievement Awards
The International Women’s Media Foundation is seeking nominations for its 2012 Courage in Journalism Awards and Lifetime Achievement Award.
Each year the Courage in Journalism Awards honor three women journalists who have demonstrated extraordinary strength of character in pursuing their profession under difficult or dangerous circumstances, such as government oppression, threats to personal safety and other intimidating obstacles. The Lifetime Achievement Award recognizes a woman journalist who has a pioneering spirit and whose determination has paved the way for future generations of women in the media.
Nominations for the 2012 awards will be accepted by the IWMF until March 2, 2012.
Candidates for the Courage in Journalism Awards can be full-time, part-time or freelance women reporters, writers, editors, photographers or producers working in any country. Digital news media candidates are accepted. Lifetime Achievement Award candidates can be either working or retired journalists. All nominations must be in English, and all nomination forms for both the Courage in Journalism Award and the Lifetime Achievement Award must be completed by an associate of the nominee. Self-nominations are not accepted.
For further information about the awards and to learn how to nominate a journalist, read here.
UNC's Susan King: Co-Founding IWMF 21 Years Ago Was ‘Turning Point in My Life'
Twenty-one years after co-founding the International Women’s Media Foundation, Susan King has reinvented herself once again and taken over as dean of the University of North Carolina School of Journalism and Mass Communication.
King, who stepped down as vice president of external affairs for Carnegie Corporation in New York, said that co-founding IWMF “was a turning point in my life when I realized the power of what we can create. I wouldn’t be here if I hadn’t broadened my horizons at IWMF.”
After taking over as dean of the UNC School of Journalism on Jan. 1, 2012, King talked to IWMF about her new job and the paths that took her to this latest challenge overseeing 700 undergraduates, more than 60 graduates and 30 PhD candidates with a staff and faculty of 110. Previously she was a TV anchor in Washington, D.C., and Buffalo, N.Y., a reporter for CNN and ABC Radio and assistant secretary for public affairs at the U.S. Department of Labor.
SK: “I never wanted to be anything but a reporter. I loved being a reporter. It was my very soul. But I started getting bored. I was repeating. I still loved journalism, but I saw that it was changing. I had time on my hands and along with Judy (Woodruff) we created what we hoped would become a nonprofit – the IWMF. When it started, we envisioned it as a global meeting of journalists from around the world. Then we started wondering if we could leave something lasting.
“Launching a nonprofit changed my life. I found I really liked making something happen. I got a real sense of satisfaction in building a nonprofit. It gave me the courage to accept something else – that’s when I took a government job. The sense of building a nonprofit and working with friends and colleagues gave me the courage to start something new.” Read more here.
M•A•C AIDS Fund Supports IWMF Fellows Investigating HIV/AIDS in South Africa
The HIV/AIDS crisis in South Africa was investigated by 10 IWMF journalism fellows, who uncovered hidden stories in the battle.
Amid the tragedy, IWMF reporting fellow Harriet Mclea of the Times found hope. She tracked an HIV-positive pregnant woman for five months as she underwent antiretroviral treatment in the hopes of delivering a healthy girl. “Oh, my God,” the mother screamed, when the doctor told her recently, “Your child is HIV-negative.” Read her story here.
With generous funding from the M•A•C AIDS Fund, Mclea and nine other South African-based reporters received one-on-one coaching with media trainers and stipends to conduct interviews and in-depth research.
Nearly 6 million South Africans are suffering from HIV – among them 3.2 million women and children. The M•A•C AIDS Fund has donated more than $8 million to HIV/AIDS programs in South African in the last decade, including the IWMF program. Read their stories here.
Four Brave Women Journalists Who Confronted Danger to Cover News Honored by International Women's Media Foundation
Four brave women journalists who have risked their lives covering the news were honored by the International Women’s Media Foundation with the 2011 Courage in Journalism Awards and a Lifetime Achievement Award in Los Angeles and New York.
IWMF’S Courage in Journalism Award winners face daunting challenges reporting the news in their countries. Mexican drug cartels have threatened to kill Zeta editor Adela Navarro Bello and have already murdered two Zeta editors, Iranian officials have targeted and harassed Reuters bureau chief Parisa Hafezi and Thai authorities have charged Prachatai editor Chiranuch Premchaiporn with breaking the law for allowing 10 strangers to post anti-royal comments on her website. Premchaiporn is standing trial now, facing up to 20 years in prison in a test of Internet freedom.
Legendary reporter Kate Adie, BBC’s first chief news correspondent, was awarded the IWMF’s Lifetime Achievement Award. Adie has paved the way for future generations of women journalists by covering breaking news from Bosnia to Sierra Leone for several decades.
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