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The official location of the PM award ceremony in September 2018!

Eloge Kaneza takes cover from bullets during protests against president Nkurunziza’s decision to seek a third term in April 2015.© SOS Media Burundi

Lukpan Akhmedyarov, 2012 PMA recipient, was clubbed, stabbed and shot for his reports on corruption. © Lukpan Akhmedyarov

Ilya Barabanov, 2010 PMA recipient, at work in an undated photo. © Ilya Barabonov

Karla Rivas (second from left) covers a community meeting. © Karla Rivas

Ilya Barabanov is led away by police during the riots that followed the Pussy Riot verdict on August 17, 2012 in Moscow. © Ilya Barabanov

Sri lanka prison officials escort Tamil journalist J.S. Tissainayagam (center) to a prison bus in Colombo on August 31, 2009 © AFP/Ishara S. Kodikara

About The Peter Mackler Award

The Peter Mackler Award honors reporters and editors who have demonstrated a commitment to fairness, accuracy and speaking truth to power, and a matching commitment to asserting the right to publish or air that story in countries where independent media is under threat.

Recipients

2017
Marcos Vizcarra
Culiacán, Mexico

2016
Eloge Willy Kaneza
Bujumbura, Burundi

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2017 Recipient: Marcos Vizcarra

2017

Marcos Vizcarra, the 2017 winner of the Peter Mackler Award, is a journalist for the publication Noroeste in his native Sinaloa region of Mexico, which is widely viewed as one of the most dangerous places in the world to practice journalism.

After the brutal, daylight murder of his colleague, Noroeste founder Javier Valdez, in the streets of Culiacan, Sinaloa, Mr. Vizcarra, 29, publicy called on the government to investigate and prosecute the killers. To date, no arrest has been made and Mr. Vizcarra’s repeated reporting and public denunciation of the government’s inaction, at great risk to himself, have made him an example for other journalists in the region to follow.

He was awarded the 2017 Peter Mackler Award on October 26, 2017 at a ceremony at the National Press Club in Washington, DC. During a powerful and emotional speech , Vizcarra named the eleven Mexican journalists killed this year trying to report in the face of rampant corruption and violence.

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