(CPJ/IFEX) – The Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) presented the 1997 International Press Freedom Awards on 23 October 1997 to six courageous journalists who have provided independent news coverage and viewpoints in the face of arrest, imprisonment, violence against them and their families, and threats of death. Receiving the awards in gala ceremonies in the […]
(CPJ/IFEX) – The Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) presented
the 1997 International Press Freedom Awards on 23 October 1997 to
six courageous journalists who have provided independent news
coverage and viewpoints in the face of arrest, imprisonment,
violence against them and their families, and threats of death.
Receiving the awards in gala ceremonies in the Grand Ballroom of
the Waldorf-Astoria in New York City were Ying Chan of the United
States and Shieh Chung-liang of Taiwan; Viktor Ivancic of
Croatia; Yelena Masyuk of Russia; and Freedom Neruda of Ivory
Coast.
An award was also presented, in absentia, to Christine Anyanwu,
imprisoned editor-in-chief of the independent Nigerian news
weekly “The Sunday Magazine”. Sentenced to life in prison in July
1995 – a sentence later commuted to fifteen years after CPJ
initiated an international protest – she is in deteriorating
health after more than two years in jail in deplorable
conditions. CPJ tonight asked the more than 800 persons attending
the dinner to sign a petition to Nigeria’s leader Gen. Sani
Abacha urging her immediate release.
A surprise moment of the dinner came when 1996 award winner Ocak
Isik Yurtcu, who was unable to attend the ceremonies in New York
last November because he was imprisoned in Turkey, rose to speak
to the gathering about the importance of the campaign that CPJ
and other international press freedom organizations waged on his
behalf. Following an emergency CPJ mission to Turkey this summer
led by CPJ Vice Chairman Terry Anderson, Yurtcu and five other
editors were released from prison in August.
Ted Koppel, anchor and managing editor of ABC’s “Nightline”,
received CPJ’s Burton Benjamin Memorial Award for his
contributions to the cause of press freedom from CPJ board member
Dan Rather, anchor and managing editor of “CBS Evening News with
Dan Rather”. Legendary broadcast news producer Fred W. Friendly
was the subject of a special tribute from CBS’s Andy Rooney.
Friendly’s wife, Ruth Friendly, responded on behalf of the famed
advocate of press freedom whose health did not permit him to
attend the ceremony. “Fred would exhort you to protect that
precious press freedom that we enjoy, not to abuse it, but to use
it responsibly,” she said.
Other speakers at the dinner were Michael D. Eisner, chairman and
chief executive officer of the Walt Disney Company, the dinner
chairman; Kati Marton, former CPJ chairman who just returned from
Bosnia on a mission on behalf of press freedom; master of
ceremonies Tom Brokaw of NBC; Peter Jennings of ABC; Christiane
Amanpour of CNN; Bill Keller of “The New York Times”; Ed Bradley
of CBS; Roger Rosenblatt, writer and essayist; Raghida Dergham,
“Al-Hayat” correspondent and president of the United Nations
Correspondents Association; Terry Anderson; and William A. Orme,
Jr., CPJ’s executive director.
Following are brief descriptions of the 1997 International Press
Freedom Award winners and their brave actions:
Christine Anyanwu, imprisoned editor in chief of the independent
Nigerian news weekly “The Sunday Magazine”, who is serving a
brutal, fifteen-year jail sentence for exposing a government ploy
to round up political opponents.
Ying Chan, U.S. correspondent and contributing editor of the Hong
Kong magazine “Yazhou Zhoukan”, an international Chinese-language
newsweekly, and Shieh Chung-liang, its Taiwan bureau chief, who
are battling a criminal libel suit by a high-ranking Taiwanese
ruling party official over their reporting of an alleged offer of
an illegal contribution to the Clinton re-election campaign.
Viktor Ivancic, editor-in-chief of “Feral Tribune”, a weekly
newspaper in Croatia, who has continued his pointed and
irreverent coverage of Croatian politics and hard-hitting
reporting of atrocities while fighting a seditious libel
conviction and death threats.
Yelena Masyuk, special correspondent of NTV, independent
television of Russia, whose incisive and balanced reporting on
the war in Chechnya under treacherous conditions, harassment by
Russian officials, and great personal risk culminated in her
kidnapping by Chechen rebels who held her and her two-man crew in
harsh conditions for 100 days.
Freedom Neruda, managing/senior editor of “La Voie”, the leading
independent daily newspaper in the Ivory Coast, who has been
arrested, physically assaulted and prosecuted for criminal libel
for criticizing the government’s policies and conduct.
