US secretary of state hands over special award to Rozina Islam

Prothom Alo special correspondent Rozina Islam has been honoured with a special award by the United States for her contribution in the fight against corruption through journalism.

The US secretary of State Antony Blinken Friday announced eight people from different countries, including Rozina Islam, as champions of the fight against corruption in the international arena this year.

On International Anti-Corruption Day (December 9), the 2022 'Anti-Corruption Champions Award' is being handed over to these eight people at the US State Department in Washington.

Each of the awardees continues to work courageously to combat corruption in their respective countries.  

According to the US department of State, the nominated honorees have demonstrated leadership, courage and influence in anti-corruption, whistle-blowing and combating corruption.

Rozina Islam who has been working at Prothom Alo for more than a decade had fallen victim to repression, torture and lawsuit trying to highlight the irregularities in the health sector of  Bangladesh during the corona outbreak.

Free Press Unlimited, an agency based in the Netherlands’s Amsterdam had awarded her with ‘Free Press Award’ under Most Resilient Journalist category for courageous journalism last year.

Along with Rozina Islam, Columbia’s Supreme Court of Justice’s investigation chamber president Marco Antonio Rueda Soto, Central Bank of Iraq’s banking supervision department general manager Qismah Salih Ali Mendeli, Madagaskar Court of Accounts president Jean De Dieu Rakatondramihamina, Malaysia’s Centre to Combat Corruption and Cronyism founding director Cynthia Gabriel, Mexican media Semanario ZETA’s reporter Antonio Cervantes Garcia, Serbian Crime and Corruption Reporting Network (KRIK) founder and chief editor Stevan Dojcinovic and Zimbabwe Coalition of Debt and Development executive director Janet Zhou has received the International Anticorruption Champions Award this year.  

Through this award US Department of State has recognised journalism’s role in preventing corruption and promoting openness in Bangladesh, said Rozina Islam.

She has dedicated the award to those vocal about protecting right to freedom of speech across the globe as well as those journalists who are struggling for finest journalism even amidst the sternest laws, intimidation, arrest, lawsuit and harassment.