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A military crackdown in Egypt, a terrorist attack on a shopping mall in Kenya, the death of a beauty queen in Mexico—those horrible events provided the canvas on which reporters and photographers painted vivid pictures of what happened around the world last year. It wasn’t just murder and mayhem that attracted the attention of the winners of the 2013 Overseas Press Club Awards. Whales, elephants and iPhones make appearances, too.
Bloomberg News’ Cam Simpson worked his way down the Apple supply chain to describe how Nepalese villagers supplied the bonded labor that goes into making a 5s smartphone. Reuters’ Steve Stecklow led a team that laid bare the $95 billion financial empire built by Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khameni. NPR’s Alex Blumberg took a simple idea, the making of a T-shirt, and followed it to the ends of the earth. And AP’s Rukmini Callimachi traveled to Timbuktu, hot on the heels of fleeing al-Qaida combatants, to gather a trove of documents strewn across 10 buildings that she use to recreate a harrowing series of pieces that captured the accolades of two judging panels, making her the first reporter ever to win both the Hal Boyle and Bob Considine awards in the same year.
Callimachi was only one of many reporters and photographers who put themselves at risk doing their jobs. The AP’s Adriana Gomez Licon was in constant danger of attack reporting her piece about a young woman killed in a shootout between Mexican drug cartels. Photographers Jerome Delay and Robert Nickelsberg ventured into war zones to bring back pictures of horror and despair. CBS correspondent Charlie D’Agata and producer Randall Joyce risked their lives to report from Cairo’s Tahrir Square during one of the bloodiest weeks in Egypt’s history. More than 75 judges on 22 panels sifted through an impressive array of entries this year to find the ones they deemed most deserving. It was a labor of love, a dedication to honoring the best of our profession—and for that we thank them as we congratulate all the winners.
Robert Friedman is the chairman of the OPC Awards Committee