Siddharth Varadarajan, deputy editor of The Hindu, has been awarded the United Nations Correspondents Association (UNCA) Award for excellence in journalism. The award was presented by UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan at the 10th annual UNCA Awards Dinner in New York on Friday.
Varadarajan was awarded the silver medal in the Elizabeth Neuffer Memorial Prize for Print Journalism for his series on Iran and the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) titled "Persian Puzzle." The gold medal was shared by Mohammad Bazzi of Newsday (for UN and the Iraqi election) and Dafna Linzer of The Washington Post (for coverage of US and Iran/IAEA). The memorial prize is sponsored by the Boston Globe and the UNCA.
Annan also presented the UNCA "Citizen of the World" award to the former UN Under-Secretary General, Sir Brian Urquhart, one of the original members of the UN. UN goodwill ambassador and actress Julia Ormond was a special guest.
This year's entries came from across the globe, a statement issued by UNCA said. The judges looked for more than just reportage. The winners have taken risks, professionally and personally, and have looked hard beneath the official releases and spin. UNCA offers $10,000 prizes in three categories for journalism in all media for coverage of the United Nations at Headquarters and in the field.
The UN Correspondents Association (UNCA) was founded in 1948 as a press club at the United Nations. The UNCA Annual Awards were established in 1995, as a global competition, to encourage in depth coverage of the United Nations and its work. In the decade since, it has honored journalists from every continent, working in all media and many languages.
In 2003, UNCA instituted the Sergio Vieira de Mello 'Citizen of the World Award,' in honour of the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, killed in Baghdad. UNCA also renamed two of our journalism prizes in honor of our colleagues, Elizabeth Neuffer, who died covering Iraq, and Ricardo Ortega, killed in Haiti.
The Ricardo Ortega Memorial Prize for Broadcast Journalism, sponsored by Antena 3 TV of Spain) saw Ishbel Matheson and Dan McMillan of BBC Radio 4 and World Service win the gold medal for their coverage of Darfur. Rory O'Connor of Globalvision, New York, and Nara Ferreira of Radio Senado, Brazil, shared the silver medal for their coverage of the 60th anniversary of the UN.
In the UN Foundation Prize for Reporting on Humanitarian and Development Affairs category, the Bangkok Post's Supara Janchitfah bagged the gold medal for reporting on the UN and human rights in Thailand. Roberta Jansen of Brazil's O Globo won the silver medal for writing on AIDS in Africa.
