By Kelechi Amakoh
The International Centre for Journalists (ICFJ) will on November 9 honour two United States of America journalists, Chris Wallace and Soraya Sarhaddi Nelson at its Awards Dinner in Washington D.C.
Chris Wallace is a Fox News anchor, while Soraya Sarhaddi Nelson works as a Correspondent with the National Public Radio.
ICFJ President, Joyce Barnathan who described the awardees as “consummate professionals” and “seekers of substance and truth,” said the centre is “delighted to single them out for their excellent work.”
Wallace, who is known for bringing a tough, but fair, interviewing style to his coverage of major news events, including a 2016 presidential debate will receive the ICFJ Founders Award for Excellence in Journalism for a lifetime commitment to the highest professional standards.
For his stellar reporting which shed light on the daily experiences of people living through turmoil in Afghanistan, the Middle East and North Africa, Nelson, the NPR foreign correspondent will be honored with ICFJ’s Excellence in International Reporting Award.
During more than four decades as a journalist at Fox, NBC and ABC, Wallace has applied his unbiased, piercing approach to interviews, whether moderating primary and general presidential debates, interviewing Democratic or Republican presidents, or leading the charge on groundbreaking investigations. In 2016, he became the first Fox News host to moderate a presidential debate, earning high praise for keeping both candidates focused on policy issues.
He joined Fox News in 2003 and secured Fox’s first interview with President Barack Obama in February 2009. He interviewed Obama more than anyone else at the network. Prior to that, he worked for 14 years as a senior correspondent for ABC’s “Primetime Thursday,” where he conducted several ground-breaking investigations.
During the first Gulf War, he reported from Tel Aviv for “Nightline.” From 1982 to 1989, he worked for NBC in key posts, from Chief White House correspondent to anchor of “Meet the Press,” making him the only person to have anchored two Sunday morning news programs.
Nelson who shared in a Pulitzer for coverage of the crash of TWA Flight 800, opened NPR’s Kabul bureau in 2006 and spent 3½ years reporting from Afghanistan. Not only did she cover the war, but she shared stories about the daily lives of Afghans, from teens struggling to get an education to women running for office in the midst of upheaval.
During that time, she also reported on the war in Iraq and moved to Cairo in 2010, months before the Arab Spring uprisings. She covered Libya’s violent regime change and became NPR’s Berlin correspondent in 2012, focusing on Europe’s refugee crisis, terrorist attacks and right-wing populism as well as Ukraine’s separatist conflict.
The ICFJ Awards Dinne is Washington, D.C.’s top international journalism event, attracting about 600 media luminaries and supporters. At the gala, ICFJ will also honour the winners of the Knight International Journalism Awards, to be announced on May 31.
To know more about the Award dinner, please visit
www.icfj.org/dinner
