The IWMF ‘Courage in Journalism Award’ celebrates female journalists who have overcome threats, oppression and the glass ceiling in their pursuit of the truth.
“These courageous journalists have faced seemingly insurmountable security threats and personal challenges in reporting on global issues and often, their impact on women,” IWMF Executive Director Elisa Lees Muñoz said. “It is an honour to celebrate their commitment to press freedom and their service to other women in their industry with our annual Courage Awards.”
di Giovanni is based in Paris and has been working for Newsweek since October 2013. In recent months, di Giovanni has written extensively about Syria – having visited the country numerous times, at great risk to her own life. A selection of her work for Newsweek ranges from visiting Kurdish fighters in Northern Iraq on the front line of the fight against ISIS, to a deeply reported piece on The Syrian Civil Defence Force, known as The White Helmets, which consists of former students, teachers, vegetable sellers and farmers that put their lives at risk to save civilians in the ongoing conflict. Her latest book, “The Morning They Came For Us: Dispatches From Syria” was published earlier this year.
Jim Impoco, Global Editor-in-Chief, Newsweek said “Janine is one of the most passionate reporters I have ever worked with, always determined to shed light on the human suffering of those caught up in conflict and disaster. At a time when journalists are targets, no one exhibits more courage than this lovely, talented, informed and ever curious person we are proud to have as part of our team at Newsweek.”
di Giovanni has contributed to many other publications and she works for the UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) in tandem with Newsweek to write advocacy reports brought to the Security Council about the plight of Syrian children with no education and Syrian refugee women.
With a particular focus on human rights abuses and war crimes, she is also part of stabilisation unit with the government of the UK – an interdepartmental agency – as well as an associate fellow at the Geneva Center for Security Policy and the New America Foundation. In addition, she is a senior policy manager and adviser to The Syria Project, at the School of Public Policy at Central European University.
di Giovanni’s focus on the human cost of war has involved her attempting to give war a face for over two decades now, while she has worked in a variety of conflict zones in exceptionally difficult and dangerous circumstances – from Sarajevo, to Chechnya, to Iraq and Afghanistan. Back in 1990, she went to the Gaza Strip and the West Bank during the first Palestinian Intifada (uprising).
di Giovanni is an advisor on the Syrian conflict for the UNHCR and lectures at universities such as Harvard, Princeton and the LSE. She was recently voted by the Action against Armed Violence as one of the world’s 100 people working to reduce armed conflict.
