Best web coverage of international affairs
AWARD YEAR: 2008
AWARD NAME: Online Journalism Award 2008
RECIPIENTS: The International Consortium of Investigative Journalists
AFFILIATION: The Center for Public Integrity
HONORED WORK: “Mexico Under Siege”
This project by the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists exemplifies how the web can be both a powerful reporting tool and a storehouse of illuminating news and information that has value far beyond the current news cycle. The sweep and breadth of this project is nothing short of remarkable. A global team of reporters — some posing as smugglers and equipped with hidden video cameras — transcended political, cultural and geographic boundaries to tell the story of a very nasty business, whose tentacles reach from renegade factories in China and Russia to Indian reservations in New York state and warlords in Pakistan and North Africa. The presentation is rough and raw and its YouTube-hosted video is not as polished as those of other entries. But the strippeddown features of this online repository of investigative reporting — text, video, interactive maps, glossary and archive — tell a compelling story and make a tremendous amount of material accessible, especially to those in low-bandwidth portions of the globe.
Citation for Excellence:
Staff of the Los Angeles Times
“Mexico Under Siege”