Amnesty International UK Media Awards
The Amnesty International Media Awards are a unique set of awards which pay tribute to the best human rights journalism in the UK. Kate Allen, Amnesty International UK’s director, said that the awards recognise the "pivotal role of the UK media industry in informing and shaping public opinion" and pays tribute to their "often dangerous work". The awards acknowledge the creativity, skills and sheer determination that it takes to get the news out in an educational and engaging way.
In particular, these awards highlight the unique relationship that exists between Amnesty International and the media. Sir Trevor McDonald explained the inextricably linked nature of this relationship: "Amnesty persists where journalism leaves off. We visit these scenes and then move on. Amnesty has the virtue of sticking with the story and making sure the truth comes out."[3]
The most recent awards ceremony was held on 26 November 2015 at the Barbican Centre in central London. The shortlist and the winners are available below.
Amnesty International has always championed the importance of media in exposing human rights abuses. Amnesty itself began as a media story. In 1961, Peter Benenson, the founder of Amnesty, was so enraged that two Portuguese students were jailed for seven years for toasting to freedom during the autocratic regime of António de Oliveira Salazar, that he wrote a letter to The Observer.
His "Appeal for Amnesty" letter called for the release of six political prisoners from around the world. It began: "Open your newspapers - any day of the week – and you will find a report from somewhere in the world of someone being imprisoned, tortured or executed because his opinions or religion are unacceptable to his government. The newspaper readers feel a sickening sense of impotence. Yet if these feelings of disgust all over the world could be united into common action, something effective could be done"
Amnesty began with a sentiment expressed through the media and to celebrate the unique relationship Amnesty shares with the media industry, the Amnesty International UK Media Awards were launched in 1992.
Amnesty believes that by recognising excellence in human rights journalism, journalists and commissioners will be encouraged to increase the quality and quantity of their human rights coverage. Good quality media coverage is important as highlighted by Aung San Suu Kyi, Burmese pro-democracy leader, at the 2011 awards ceremony because it is "through the media that the rest of the world gets to hear about what we have to undergo".[53]
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