for uncovering how both sides in Yemen’s civil war have sought to profit from the U.N. campaign against the world’s biggest cholera outbreak, skimming money from treatment programs and, in the case of the Houthi rebels, blocking badly needed vaccines in an attempt to wrest concessions. https://bit.ly/2IBCfMK
for their in-depth, analytical package looking at 30 years of global warming. https://bit.ly/2yU6NWF
The civil war gripping Yemen for the last three years has created one of the world’s worst humanitarian disasters as millions of people face starvation. In an effort to understand the scope of the crisis, The Associated Press launched a one-year project with the Pulitzer Center, a non-profit news organization that helps cover underreported stories internationally.
AP Cairo-based reporter Maggie Michael, one of the few journalists who has followed the unfolding tragedy in Yemen from the beginning, often at great risk, used the Pulitzer grant for an extended reporting trip across Yemen with Cairo photographer Nariman el-Mofty and Yemen-based videographer Maad al-Zekri.
They drove more than 400 miles through five governorates, including one harrowing drive near an active front line outside of Khoukha, from their base in Aden. They interviewed mothers and families affected, plus food experts, doctors and volunteers, and they found that more than 8.4 million of the nation’s 29 million people rely almost completely on food aid.
The team’s courageous efforts to tell this story win the Beat of the Week.
for their yearlong coverage of Yemen’s war, capped with a groundbreaking exclusive exposing how corruption in food aid distribution is worsening the country’s hunger crisis. The package was accompanied by a beautiful photo essay on Yemenis encountered in the team’s travels and a video explainer that helped our consumers understand an enormously complicated war.https://bit.ly/2ViNI7Ehttps://bit.ly/2Fkib0uhttps://bit.ly/2LYleMt
Since Oct. 7, Associated Press staff in Gaza and Israel have worked tirelessly to cover the war — and to go beyond the news with deep, impactful coverage.
From live feeds and NR/CR videos to powerful photographs, text stories, audio and interactives, the Associated Press has written the first draft of history by covering the spot news around the clock — and by going deeper with resonant journalism about individuals directly affected by the war. These stories are written by colleagues who themselves have evacuated their homes and struggle to get food and water, by colleagues for whom air raid sirens have become a part of daily life.
Outside of the region, colleagues have written thoughtful analysis and all-formats takeouts on the broader resonance of the Israel-Hamas war. They’ve edited text, photos and video and worked to ensure that our standards are met throughout the report.
Because of that work across the AP, we this week honor all of those colleagues who’ve contributed to the urgency, breadth and depth of the report across all formats in our coverage of the Israel-Hamas war with a Special Citation, most especially those in the region.
for her harrowing investigation revealing widespread sexual abuses and torture in United Arab Emirates-run prisons in Yemen. https://bit.ly/2tDE0jY
AP investigative reporter Maggie Michael has done landmark reporting on Yemen’s civil war throughout the past year, revealing abuses by the Saudi-led coalition that controls much of the south of the country.
But there had been a major gap in the coverage for all media: putting the same scrutiny on the other side in the conflict, the Houthi rebels who control the north. The Houthis impose strict controls on reporters, and sources are afraid to talk, problems that have prevented journalists from reporting in-depth on abuses carried out by the Houthis during the 4-year-old civil war.
Michael found another way. She and Cairo photographer Nariman El-Mofty travelled to the coalition-controlled city of Marib, where they could meet freely with victims of the Houthis who had fled the rebels’ rule. There, former prisoners described horrifying tortures at the hands of the Houthis. Nariman’s riveting visuals encapsulated the suffering, including photos of a man recovering from horrific acid burns, draped in red bandages.
The reporting, supported partly by a grant from the Pulitzer Center on Crisis Reporting, was a breakthrough, as it has been rare to see atrocities by Houthis so prominently featured. Rather than denying the story, a top Houthi figure called for an investigation into allegations of torture in the movement’s prisons.
For their investigation that exposed in raw, excruciating detail the scope of torture committed by the Houthis, Michael and El-Mofty share AP's Best of the Week award.
for telling the story of how the war in Afghanistan came home to a hamlet in upstate New York. The town celebrated their homegrown warrior, Army Sgt. James Johnston – who was only 7 when the war that claimed his life began – and the soldier’s young widowed bride Krista and their unborn infant.https://bit.ly/33GF1rfhttps://bit.ly/35J7bUwhttps://bit.ly/31nVb7i
for bringing to light, with dramatic words and images, the largely unseen story of Ethiopians trying to reach jobs in Saudi Arabia who instead are systematically imprisoned, tortured, raped and starved by traffickers in a remote village on Yemen’s coast. The team brought the victims to life by reaching the site and finding migrants who had escaped only hours earlier, their wounds still fresh; one man died of starvation just hours after the AP saw him.https://bit.ly/2oPBTKOhttps://bit.ly/34Ma5GPhttps://bit.ly/32nYtIr
exclusively broke a story with both irony and foreboding: Scientists who set out to study the impact of climate change on a massive Antarctic glacier are being largely thwarted because global warming has produced an iceberg and attracted sea ice, preventing the ships from reaching their destination. At least for now, the multinational expedition is unable to reach Thwaites, the so-called Doomsday Glacier the size of Florida that is melting quickly.Because COVID concerns meant journalists could not join the research party, Washington-based climate and science reporter Bornstein developed sources among the scientists. One of them agreed to try a Zoom interview from the expedition and that interview was packed with news. Borenstein also reached out to other scientists; the resulting all-formats package played widely in the U.S. and overseas.Read more
for uncovering a series of deals made by U.S. allies in Yemen with al-Qaida and revealing how closely they fight together against the rebels. https://bit.ly/2MpnKL5
made AP the first major news organization to take a serious look at readiness in the countries most likely to be affected, as fighting around Ukraine’s nuclear power plants and Russia’s threats to use nuclear weapons reawaken nuclear fears in Europe. Some of Ukraine’s neighboring countries have started distributing potassium iodide pills, and officials are preparing old Soviet-era nuclear shelters for possible use.After two weeks spent persuading authorities to give AP’s journalists access to the underground shelters, the team reported comprehensively and responsibly — and with strong visuals — on European readiness for a possible nuclear attack. The team was careful to avoid sensationalizing the coverage or raising unnecessary fear.Read more
for scoring an exclusive by obtaining an advanced look at a previously unseen handwritten letter written by Albert Einstein in which the renowned scientist warned about the rise of anti-Semitism in Germany more than a decade before the Nazis seized power.https://bit.ly/2zQdd6phttps://bit.ly/2PuxGIV
for revealing the extent of the United Arab Emirates' network of secret prisons in southern Yemen – at least 18 black sites – and the pervasiveness of torture. Her work forced U.S. officials to confirm for the first time that American interrogators have questioned detainees from the prisons, a potential violation of international law that would counter efforts to disassociate the U.S. war on terror from the use of torture. http://apne.ws/2s5h22B
for combining to produce a riveting narrative that helped AP’s audience understand life in war-torn Yemen, and breaking investigative ground on the United States’ ongoing drone war there, including revealing the number of civilians killed by drones this year.https://bit.ly/2Br8XfNhttps://bit.ly/2R2ZyjZ
“... Due to the distractions caused by the unfounded AP article last week, I am stepping down as President of YOUR college effective immediately.”
Rear Admiral Jeffrey Harley, head of the elite U.S. Naval War College, pushed the button on that all-staff missive Monday after the Navy announced it was reassigning him in the wake of exclusive reporting by Jennifer McDermott and Michelle R. Smith – reporting that produced two APNewsBreaks in 72 hours.
Their first NewsBreak moved Friday, confirming the military was investigating allegations that Harley spent excessively, abused his hiring authority and otherwise behaved inappropriately, including keeping a margarita machine in his office. Three days later, the AP team was first again with word that the Navy was removing Harley from his post pending the outcome of its probe.
Both stories gained huge traction with customers and on social media. The scoops by McDermott’s and Smith were “just the tip of the iceberg,” one source said, and they’ve since led to new tips.
For dogged and diligent reporting that exposed questionable leadership at the heart of the Navy’s brain trust, McDermott and Smith win this week’s Best of the States prize.
for using dozens of public records requests to break news on the FBI’s efforts to warn American colleges and universities that they’re vulnerable to economic and industrial espionage by China. Emails obtained by AP underscore the extent of U.S. concerns that universities, as recruiters of foreign talent and incubators of cutting-edge research, present a particularly inviting target for espionage. https://bit.ly/2ovvbtc
using the Bambuser live video app on his iPhone for the first time, transmitted live footage of Elizabeth Warren showing up to vote on Super Tuesday. His video was so good, both NBC and ABC used it, and ABC – which had its own camera following Warren – switched to Binkley's shot midfeed. https://bit.ly/2TJ0XzV
The Life Care Center in Kirkland, Washington, has emerged as the epicenter of the COVID-19 outbreak in the United States. At least 35 coronavirus deaths have been linked to the facility, and more than half of those inside have tested positive, leaving the remaining residents in a sort of purgatory that has anguished their relatives.
Photographer Ted Warren has spent much of his time recently outside the long-term care center, documenting in heartrending photos how people have tried to communicate with mothers, fathers and loved ones through windows because visitors are no longer allowed inside.
Warren found an ideal subject for conveying this desperation in the story of 86-year-old Chuck Sedlacek. With reporting by Gene Johnson, the pair delivered a package that detailed the isolation and anguish faced by the nursing home residents and their families – a feeling of helplessness many more are likely to experience as the disease spreads across the country.
For compelling work that conveys the frustration and despair of families coping with the coronavirus at a facility in the glare of the media spotlight, Warren and Johnson earn this week’s Best of the States award.
As stories with impact go, this one stands out: The lead subject of the piece, struggling to feed her family during the pandemic, was tracked down on social media and hired by a reader for a job.
The all-formats package by reporter Luis Andres Henao and visual journalist Jessie Wardarski chronicled the struggle of Sharawn Vinson and her Brooklyn family as they coped with a shortage of food and other crises, taking readers into the lives of a family that was forced to separate to keep everyone fed. The details shared by the family give readers a better understanding of the issues confronting many of the nation’s most vulnerable during the pandemic.
For a rare, intimate look at a family on the front lines of food insecurity brought on by the coronavirus, documented with riveting photos and video, Henao and Wardarski share this week’s Best of the States award.
