for a report that the Trump administration is considering using military bases as other federal properties on the West Coast to export coal and natural gas to Asia after several major port proposals have been blocked by coastal states. https://bit.ly/2J2Xzca
With the end of the war in Afghanistan looming, national writer Matt Sedensky sought a compelling way to humanize Americaâs longest war â and he found it. Nearly all the American troops killed in the war had their remains returned to Dover Air Force Base in Delaware, where the military runs a mortuary. There, Sedensky found chaplain David Sparks, who had been called to active duty after 9/11, assigned to the mortuary, and had been there ever since.
Sedensky pieced together Sparksâ experience: writing hundreds of prayers for the dead, standing beside their disfigured remains and ministering to their broken families. Joined by New York video journalist Jessie Wardarski and Washington photographer Carolyn Kaster, the team had access to parts of the base hidden far from public view. The resulting package, with Sedenskyâs expressive prose and affecting visuals by Wardarski and Kaster, generated a strong response from veterans and non-military alike.
For intimate, revealing work that eloquently writes one of the closing chapters of Americaâs 20-year war, the team of Sedensky, Kaster and Wardarski earns this weekâs Best of the States award.
for revealing that despite mandated reforms, the Pentagon still struggles to provide justice when the children of service members sexually assault each other. Acting on a tip to Dunklin, their story describes the case of a 13-year-old boy accused of molesting at least 10 younger children on a U.S. Air Force base in Japan. The girlsâ mothers say Air Force officials showed little urgency to offer counseling or investigate. âHow is this OK?â asked a mother who locked her kids indoors. https://bit.ly/2XZXbSf
The plot was bold: Fuel a military uprising in Venezuela by shifting the loyalty of key leaders, putting them in opposition to President Nicolas Maduro. But the plan to help the U.S.-backed opposition leader backfired at the moment of truth, prompting an understandable reaction from press to find out what went wrong.
While most other media speculated, AP Andean News Director Joshua Goodman used dogged reporting and years of source development to break the untold story of how the Obama and Trump administrations missed golden opportunities to woo two generals that the White House said were central to the plan.
The story garnered major play among customers and APNews users, and even earned the attention of U.S. Sen. Marco Rubio, a driver of U.S. policy on Venezuela, who praised Goodman on Twitter.
For unearthing pivotal clues around a shadowy turn of international events, Goodman wins APâs Best of the Week.
As the COVID-19 pandemic raged across the world last week, and the confirmed U.S. death toll approached 100,000, AP photographers on two continents found unusual and meaningful ways to bring home the tragedy of lives lost. They were:
â Photographer David Goldman, who met with the families of COVID-19 victims at a Massachusetts soldiersâ home, literally projecting veteransâ images onto the exterior of the familiesâ homes for a series of arresting, ghostly and emotion-laden scenes.
â And Rodrigo Abd, who spent weeks with Venezuelan migrants collecting bodies in a poor area of Lima, Peru, showing the abject desperation of that cityâs victims. Also honored is Lima reporter Franklin Briceño who accompanied Abd, documenting for text and video the funeral home workers on their grueling rounds.
Both projects had immense impact online and in print, drawing praise from readers and editors. For intrepid and creative multiformat storytelling emphasized by unforgettable images, Goldman, Abd and Briceño share APâs Best of the Week honors.
used interviews with dozens of witnesses, social media, satellite imagery and data on deaths to expose a campaign of massacres conducted by Myanmarâs military.Since it took over the government last February, the Myanmar military has been escalating its violence against both the opposition and civilians, and has reverted to scorched-earth tactics as a weapon of war.Reporting out of Myanmar is difficult at the best of times, with the constant danger to sources and the lack of access. This story was particularly challenging as the reporters pulled it off in three weeks, start to finish, working through vacations and holidays. Special credit goes to APâs stringers, who found and interviewed 40 witnesses.The team â video journalists McNeil and Jain, and Asia reporter Rising â also brought important context and understanding to the subject that comes from the APâs previous coverage of Myanmar. They noted that the massacres and burnings signal a return to practices the military has long used against ethnic minorities such as the Muslim Rohingya â this time applied also to the Buddhist Bamar majority. In recent months, most of the massacres have happened in the countryâs northwest, including in a region that is largely Bamar.The story was also timely, coming just days after a massacre of at least 35 civilians by the military on Christmas Eve.https://aplink.news/615https://aplink.video/33k
for persistence in obtaining medical records that showed a paraplegic man who died during clashes with Israeli forces was killed by a bullet that struck him in the head. The army, which initially dismissed the shooting, launched an investigation following Akramâs story. http://bit.ly/2qnpFco
This AP exclusive started with a tip: A Republican nominee in Ohio had made questionable claims about his tenure in the Air Force.
J.R. Majewski told voters he was a combat veteran with a tour of duty in Afghanistan, but reporters Brian Slodysko and James LaPorta, joined by investigative researcher Randy Herschaft, reported extensively using public documents, expert interviews and a survey of former employers, revealing that among multiple misrepresentations, Majewski did not deploy to Afghanistan but instead spent six-months loading planes in Qatar. He was also demoted and barred from reenlisting.
The story was a hit with readers and had rival news outlets citing APâs exclusive, while the Republican Party pulled its advertising money from Majewski, essentially giving up on his race.
For deep source work and dogged reporting that exposed a political candidateâs blatant lies about his record, Slodysko, LaPorta and Herschaft take APâs Best of the Week â First Winner honors.
for exclusively reporting the latest updates in the military's investigation into the nude photo-sharing scandal at a rare visit to the base at Quantico. http://apne.ws/2q4aaUG
The horror tales from Niger â as reported by some of the worldâs most reputable media â were gruesome: Sgt. La David Johnson, one of four Americans who died on a mysterious U.S. Army Special Forces mission in early October, had been captured alive, tortured, killed execution-style at close range and his remains had been mutilated.
The details were all erroneous, it turned out.
It took the APâs Pentagon reporter Lita Baldor to set the record straight with a stunning scoop on an otherwise quiet Washington Sunday in December, revealing the findings of a still confidential Pentagon report.
For an unmatched story that revealed the heroism of an American soldier who died in the line of duty, Baldor wins this weekâs Beat of the Week.
With the Ukrainian port city of Mariupol under siege by Russian forces, two courageous AP journalists, Germany-based video journalist Mstyslav Chernov and Kyiv photographer Evgeniy Maloletka, have been out in the streets, day in and day out, virtually alone in chronicling the cityâs fall into chaos, despair and utter isolation, and the suffering of the civilian population.
Driving a van with windows blown out by explosions and filing their video and photos when they can establish communications, the pair has been the worldâs only eyes on a key city that is suffering at the hands of the Russian offensive. Their images and words have riveted the worldâs attention.
For harrowing reporting from a besieged city that would go unseen without their unflinching courage, we are honored to award the pair APâs Best of the Week â First Winner.
for her persistence in getting the Department of Veterans Affairs to acknowledge its health insurance plan was running out of money despite an emergency infusion of funds. http://bit.ly/2xZ7gmw
From images of a young girl killed by shelling to an eyewitness account of a makeshift maternity ward inside a bomb shelter, APâs team of more than two dozen journalists across Ukraine documented for the world in vivid detail how the Russian invasion is playing out on the ground.
The all-formats coverage began as Russian troops massed at Ukraineâs borders and has not let up since the assault began more than a week ago.
AP staffers across the world have been vital in explaining the economic, political and social repercussions of the war, but the journalists in Ukraine have been the anchor â setting APâs coverage apart, delivering memorable images and authoritative text as the story develops by the hour.For tenacity and bravery in chronicling the Russian invasion, the team in Ukraine earns the respect and gratitude of their colleagues worldwide and is APâs Best of the Week â First Winner.
for a scoop confirming the destruction of several U.S. military aircraft in a deadly al-Shabab attack on a Kenya base used by U.S. troops. The report was widely cited by The New York Times, The Guardian, the BBC and others. https://bit.ly/2T7jKoD
studied internal Veterans Affairs documents and inspector general reports, and worked sources among VA nurses and on Capitol Hill to report that the agency responsible for the health care of 9 million veterans was struggling to deal with the coronavirus. VA nurses were going to work without adequate protection against the virus and some 1,900 VA health care workers have contracted the coronavirus, according to agency documents obtained by the AP. Twenty have died. https://bit.ly/35msqLY
Ten years ago, Kristin M. Hall noticed several cases in which U.S. troops stole military guns and sold them to the public. Hall, a military beat reporter at the time, then fired off the first of many Freedom of Information Act requests. The Army, however, refused to release any records and the story could easily have ended there, with Hall moving on to become a Nashville-based entertainment video journalist focused on country music. Yet, she kept at it.
Last week, Hallâs decade-long journey â and the work of a host of others on the global investigations, data and immersive storytelling teams â paid off in âAWOL Weapons,â a multilayered, visually rich project revealing that at least 1,900 military weapons â from handguns to rocket launchers â had been either lost or stolen during the 2010s, with some used in street violence in America.
Two days after publication, the Pentagonâs top general and the Army each said they would seek systematic fixes for the missing weapon problem, and through a spokesman, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff called APâs investigation âanother example of the free press shining a light on the important subjects we need to get right.â
With deep reporting and a riveting digital presentation, the multistory package saw outstanding customer use and reader engagement.
For remarkable persistence that revealed a problem the military wanted to keep quiet, generating immediate prospects for reform, Hall receives special distinction alongside colleagues Justin Pritchard, James LaPorta, Justin Myers and Jeannie Ohm as winners of APâs Best of the Week award.
for Semanskyâs exclusive photos and video of the tanks that President Donald Trump ordered into Washington for his July 4 celebrations. Baldor passed along a tip from a Pentagon source and Semansky found the small rail yard where the armored vehicles were being held, making AP first to confirm the presence of the military equipment in the capital. https://bit.ly/2S5SMLE
A trio of AP journalists had no idea exactly what they would find when they were directed to a monastery in recently liberated Izium, Ukraine.
There, correspondent Lori Hinnant, photographer Evgeniy Maloletka and video journalist Vasilisa Stepanenko found a former Ukrainian soldier in hiding, tortured three times by occupying Russian forces. His disturbing tale would supply the narrative for an exclusive investigation that uncovered 10 torture sites. The journalists gained access to five of them and spoke to more than a dozen torture survivors, and to two families whose loved ones had disappeared
The all-formats package, revealing arbitrary, widespread, routine torture of civilians and soldiers alike in Izium, immediately resonated, earning wide play and high readership.
For a gritty, deeply reported all-formats investigation that made an impact, exposing evidence of Russian war crimes and the human consequences, Hinnant, Stepanenko and Maloletka earn APâs Best of the Week â First Winner honors.
It was a story that took months of planning and coordination across a half-dozen countries and two continents: the 75th anniversary of the D-Day invasion that marked the turning point for the Allied victory in World War II. The Associated Press has had a presence on the beaches of Normandy since the actual invasion in 1944, but APâs teams in Europe knew that the 2019 event would require an extra effort â it was likely the last major anniversary that veterans who fought in the battle would be alive to tell their stories.
Staffers in Europe and the U.S. went to work months in advance of this crucial anniversary to lay out detailed plans of the distinctive coverage, bringing together reporters in all formats and in multiple countries.
Thanks to the cross-continent teamwork and significant planning and customer outreach, the play was superb. Dozens of customers used the video packages, and the photos and text stories have been mainstays on front pages since the package rolled out, culminating with standout spot coverage of the anniversary.
For outstanding effort, sensitivity and creativity that gave APâs audiences unparalleled D-Day anniversary coverage, Schaeffer, Leicester, Combaldieu, Camus, Turnbull and Santana â in coordination with their many colleagues â share APâs Best of the Week honors.
collaborated across formats to report on the latest story in APâs ongoing investigation of missing military weapons, revealing a weapon-tracking technology that the U.S. Department of Defense itself describes as a âsignificantâ security risk.After showing that the military has lost track of at least 1,900 guns, investigative reporter LaPorta and team trained their sights on how technology might help in weapons accountability. They found that one solution â putting radio frequency identification tracking tags inside guns â has introduced a security vulnerability into Army and Air Force units because it could help even relatively low-tech enemies target U.S. troops on the battlefield. The Pentagon originally appeared unaware that some units were using RFID, then said it allows service branches to explore innovative solutions. To demonstrate the highly technical story in understandable ways, LaPorta and editor Pritchard arranged field testing that showed the tags could be tracked from much greater distances than RFID contractors acknowledge. Photographer Berger and video journalist Chea illustrated the testing. Producers Roosblad and Hamlin turned that material into a sharp explainer video with the help of editors Ohm and Vadarevu. Storytelling producer Castañeda curated the AWOL Weapons hub and worked with Sison for the photo edit, while Nashvilleâs Hall contributed important reporting.https://aplink.news/cqmhttps://aplink.video/6l4https://apnews.com/hub/awol-we...
