Our story, nominated in the online media category, revealed that Serbia had sent weapons to Myanmar after the February 2021 coup in that country. We looked into how Serbia illegally exported 4.7 million euros worth of rockets to the Asian country just days after a coup that led to civil war there. The story, which was created in collaboration with the Myanmar organization Myanmar Witness and the Dutch organization Lighthouse, is available HERE.
In its explanation, the jury noted that information about the bloody conflict in Myanmar was difficult to obtain even for the world’s major media outlets:
“However, CINS and BIRN journalists managed to present hard-to-reach data to citizens and once again raised the question of why Serbia is ignoring United Nations resolutions and violating its own regulations in the arms trade, with its weapons ending up on the world’s bloodiest battlefields.”
In this category, the “Dejan Anastasijević” award went to journalists of the Vojvodina Investigative and Analytical Centre (VOICE), Miloš Katić and Slađana Gluščević. Their story was about the state sale of property worth 1.82 billion euros for a much lower price to a loss-making company.
BIRN’s story on Macedonian companies owned by Predrag Koluvija, the owner of Jovanjica, was also shortlisted.
In addition to online media, the award is handed out in two other categories – print and electronic media.
Journalist of Vreme weekly, Jovana Gligorijević, won the print media award for her article “Sexual Violence in The Petnica Research Center – Conspiracy of Silence that Lasted a Long Time”. Nominees included journalists Saša Dragojlo and Nemanja Rujević.
In the category of electronic media, the award went to N1’s Mladen Savatović, with N1 television also winning the remaining two nominations, specifically Jelena Mirković and Vanja Đurić.
This year, a total of 67 journalists applied for the “Dejan Anastasijević” award for excellence in investigative journalism, and their applications were considered by a jury consisting of Vreme editor-in-chief Filip Švarm, journalist and teacher at the Department of Media Studies at the Faculty of Philosophy in Novi Sad Dinko Gruhonjić, Jug Press editor Ljiljana Stojanović, and journalist Mirjana Jevtović.
The award is handed out annually by the Independent Journalists’ Association of Serbia (NUNS) with support from the Embassy of the United States of America, on the occasion of the World Press Freedom Day, which is celebrated on May 3.
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