Beat of the Week

(Honorable Mention)

AP team dominates coverage of controversial Belarus vote

overcame a beating at the hands of police and an internet blackout to deliver compelling footage and images, including exclusive interviews, throughout the disputed Belarus presidential election. When the state-run exit poll was announced after the vote, showing longtime authoritarian president President Alexander Lukashenko with 80% of the vote, thousands took to the streets. They were met with force by riot police as the government shut down the internet and tried to close the country off from the rest of the world. Video journalist Mstyslav Chernov was among those beaten and detained as police clashed with protesters.Despite the obstacles, AP outperformed the competition, working around the blackout to transmit strong all-formats coverage to the world ahead of other agencies.https://bit.ly/31PWEWahttps://bit.ly/2DCMZKNhttps://bit.ly/2XSMuCYhttps://bit.ly/3kysJdT

Beat of the Week

(Honorable Mention)

Tip, source work reveal Pence immigration order to CDC

worked sources and turned a tip into an exclusive story detailing how Vice President Mike Pence ordered the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention to use the pandemic as justification to halt immigration into the U.S., over the objections of the agency's scientists who twice refused to take the action.

Burke notified Dearen, who started working CDC sources. After a couple of fruitless weeks, he succeeded in identifying a person close to the events who agreed to talk, and a former Pence aide who confirmed the story on the record.

Meanwhile Burke moved the story beyond politics to bring home the order’s human toll. She gathered data that showed nearly 150,000 people, including 8,800 migrant children, already had been expelled under the order, and she interviewed the father of a 16-year-old Honduran boy who had been held in government custody under the order.

Even on a weekend dominated by news of Trump’s hospitalization, the piece was the top story on AP News and was widely used and cited by local and national news outlets. https://bit.ly/2SvTB14

Best of the Week — First Winner

AP exposes palm oil labor abuses linked to the world’s top brands, major banks

While covering the Rohingya crisis, investigative reporters Robin McDowell and Margie Mason knew tens of thousands of refugees fleeing Myanmar were vulnerable to exploitation. They suspected desperate men were being tricked or sold into the massive palm oil industry that supplies some of America’s most iconic food and cosmetic brands.

Working with photographers Gemunu Amarasinghe and Binsar Bakkara, they vividly documented the horrors some workers in Malyasia and Indonesia face. Workers spoke of brutal conditions including child labor, outright slavery and allegations of rape.

Reaction was swift, with the  U.S. government saying it would block shipments from a major Malaysian producer mentioned in the story.

For exposing abuses affecting tens of thousands of workers in a global industry that manufactures a vast array of products we buy and use daily, McDowell, Mason, Amarasinghe and Bakkara win AP’s Best of the Week award.

Beat of the Week

(Honorable Mention)

India team exposes the truth behind India’s low virus death rate

delivered an ambitious all-formats package led by a compelling character profile to unravel the mystery behind India’s relatively low COVID-18 fatalities number, which experts say is an undercount. India has 5.4 million confirmed cases of coronavirus infection, but only 87,000 deaths. After numerous conversations with experts, health care officials and workers across the country, Ghosal and Saaliq offered a critical counternarrative, showing that India is not counting many deaths.

The story began with the personal narrative of Narayan Mitra, whose family said he wasn’t counted as a coronavirus victim by doctors who said the virus was “incidental” since he had a pre-existing disease. The story also showed how Indian states were not complying with the Health Ministry guidelines to record all suspected virus deaths, including those who likely died of COVID-19 but weren’t tested for it.https://bit.ly/2Ev4tZZ

Beat of the Week

(Honorable Mention)

AP scoop: Mexico diverted development funds under US pressure

used public records requests and persistent reporting to scoop the competition on Mexico’s diversion, under U.S. pressure, of more than $4 million from a fund meant to address the root causes of migration. The money was instead used to bus asylum seekers away from the U.S. border and renovate immigration detention centers. Former officials and experts reacted to the story with harsh criticism of the administration of President Andrés Manual López Obrador. https://bit.ly/33Dn5iK

Beat of the Week

(Honorable Mention)

Desperate African migrants risk deadly Atlantic crossing

revealed that migration from Africa to Europe is still happening in the depths of the coronavirus pandemic – and shifting from the Mediterranean to the deadly Atlantic route. The Barcelona-based journalists traveled to the Canary Islands and saw firsthand boats full of migrants – including some who had died – arriving on the Spanish archipelago.The pair was kicked out of the port area for trying to document arrivals because it’s such a sensitive subject, and many sources, under government pressure, stopped talking to the AP. But the AP team worked around the restrictions, getting access to migrants and spending time with them. Brito and Morenatti reported that more than 250 people are known to have died or gone missing so far this year, and at least 20 bodies were recovered in the week we there, evidence of the extreme risk taken on the ocean crossing.The story attracted attention in Europa and Africa with high engagement, particularly for the photos and video.

Beat of the Week

(Honorable Mention)

Despite reports to the contrary, AP finds redwoods still standing

broke the news that the massive and renowned old-growth redwood trees at Big Basin Redwoods State Park had largely survived the region’s devastating wildfires. After other media reported that the ancient trees were “doomed” and had been “wiped out,” Mendoza and Sanchez hiked several smoky miles over waist-high fallen trees to find that the old-growth trees in the park – including the iconic Father and Mother of the Forest – were most definitely standing and had not burned. Even the signs marking the trees were unscathed.The positive news resonated with readers as far away as Iran and India, generating heavy engagement. https://bit.ly/31RxYOh

Best of the Week — First Winner

Dual honorees: Stunning coverage of Belarus protests, and a Ganges River odyssey

This week two distinctly different bodies of work share AP’s weekly honors for their outstanding coverage:

An all-formats team in Minsk, Belarus, facing constant police intimidation, continued to provide extensive coverage of mass protests over the nation’s disputed presidential election. That work included exclusive video of a bloody protester falling to the ground dead in front of heavily armed police, footage that forced the government to reverse its narrative of the incident.

And in work of a different dimension entirely, New Delhi photographer Altaf Qadri spent many months documenting life along the 1,700-mile River Ganges, considered sacred by almost 1 billion Hindus in India. 

Starting with a treacherous two-day hike to the foot of the Himalayas – the remote source of the Ganges – and ending in the fast disappearing mangrove forests of the Sundarbans, Qadri captured a breathtaking range along his odyssey: celebration and death, solitude and fellowship, daily life and holy rites. 

For extraordinary work in enterprise and spot news journalism, Altaf Qadri and the Belarus team of Mstyslav Chernov, Sergei Grits, Yuras Karmanau, Dimitri Kozlov and Dmitri Lovetsky share AP’s Best of the Week award.

Beat of the Week

(Honorable Mention)

AP scoop on Justice Department investigation of Yale discrimination

landed a scoop on a Justice Department investigation into higher education. Balsamo got word through sources that the two-year investigation was completed and had found something attention-grabbing: Yale University was illegally discriminating against Asian American and white applicants, in violation of federal civil rights law. Working with education reporter Collin Binkley, the pair scrambled to move a story that crushed other major news outlets by nearly an hour. Thanks to Binkley’s reporting, the AP was also first to get Yale’s statement on the probe, which it said was “hasty” and unfair. https://bit.ly/34cw1gT

Beat of the Week

(Honorable Mention)

Sourcing, hustle put AP far ahead with story of Israel-UAE ties

dominated from the start with fast, comprehensive and nuanced reporting on the diplomatic ties initiated between Israel and the United Arab Emirates. Lee had a heads-up that the deal was in the offing hours ahead of the announcement and obtained a copy of the forthcoming statement. That gave Federman and Gambrell time to prewrite a story and an alert ahead of the anticipated tweet from President Donald Trump. When Trump’s tweet duly landed, AP’s NewsAlert moved a minute later, just before White House reporters entered the Oval Office. And another minute later, a 1,000-word, triple-byline story hit the wire. Meanwhile AP broadcast colleagues, also alerted, were well ahead of the competition with coverage of developments and reaction from Middle East points. https://bit.ly/3ha2J6i

Beat of the Week

(Honorable Mention)

All-formats team out front on death of Seoul mayor

scored repeated beats in all formats when news broke that the Seoul mayor had gone missing amid a sexual harassment complaint. AP’s late-night news alerts on the discovery of the mayor’s body were well ahead of the competition; the print story led front pages on websites worldwide and BBC cited AP in its own copy.https://bit.ly/3h3FTNnhttps://bit.ly/391u3AIhttps://bit.ly/393YG8n

Best of the States

The pandemic crisis ‘laid bare’ in AP report from Texas maternity ward

Few places in America have been as hard hit by the pandemic as the Texas border, and the package by this all-formats team exposes the stark contrast between this part of the country and regions with greater resources. 

With access to two hospitals overwhelmed by cases in the Rio Grande Valley, AP reporter Paul Weber, photographer Eric Gay and video journalist John Mone carefully documented stories of patients and staff, including a new mom in the maternity ward who unknowingly contracted the virus and had to be isolated from her newborn. 

Weber wrote: “The U.S. failure to contain the pandemic has been laid bare.”

For a compelling and hard-to-report all-formats package, Weber, Gay and Mone win this week’s Best of the States award.

Beat of the Week

(Honorable Mention)

Exclusive visuals of largest COVID-19 final-round test

delivered impressive, carefully negotiated all-formats coverage as a leading U.S. COVID-19 vaccine candidate began final-round testing with volunteers in Binghamton, New York. The exclusive images – photo and video – were heavily played worldwide. The coverage also included an update on the original volunteers who received injections in Washington State in March.https://bit.ly/33ALS8Hhttps://bit.ly/3i9Jmue

Beat of the Week

(Honorable Mention)

AP: Trump administration spending millions on questionable research

followed the crumbs in a whistleblower complaint to detail how the Trump administration is spending millions on questionable coronavirus research with little basis in science. The two obtained additional internal government emails and documents showing scientists’ skepticism about a $21 million deal to assess whether the active ingredient in the heartburn-relief medication Pepcid could be an effective remedy for severely ill COVID-19 patients.https://bit.ly/338l3sA

Beat of the Week

(Honorable Mention)

Hit by water cannon, AP’s Balilty captures iconic photo of Israeli protests

Oded Balilty, acting chief photographer, Jerusalem, has gained widespread attention in Israel and abroad for his body of work – breaking news images and striking portraits – depicting Israel’s wave of anti-government protests. His photo of a young man holding an Israeli flag as he is doused by a police water cannon emerged as the most iconic image of this summer of unrest, in which protesters accuse Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of corruption and say he has bungled the country’s response to the coronavirus.

On July 18, protesters were blocking a street when police surprised them with water cannons. Balilty himself took a blast of water to the face and was stunned for several minutes. After drying out his gear, he lay on the ground to stay out of the line of fire, then noticed the protester holding a flag. While there were dozens of journalists covering the event, Balilty’s dramatic and evocative photo appeared throughout Israeli media and on news sites around the world.https://bit.ly/3feHhv8https://bit.ly/2EwtjZ4

Beat of the Week

(Honorable Mention)

AP: Global humanitarian aid has dropped despite mounting need

lobbied hard to get exclusive advance access to data and findings of a global study showing that international aid funding has dropped by a third compared to the same period last year as governments buckle under the financial strains of the COVID-19 pandemic. Anna developed the reporting by speaking to aid workers in vulnerable countries on the effects they were seeing and also to top humanitarian officials. https://bit.ly/2X71M71

Beat of the Week

(Honorable Mention)

AP: Chinese company claims it tested vaccine on employees

revealed that in the global race to find a COVID-19 vaccine, SinoPharm, a state-owned Chinese company, claimed it gave experimental shots to top pharma executives and employees, raising ethical concerns. The all-formats coverage examining the ethics of researchers testing vaccines and remedies on themselves was a global effort, with contributions from AP journalists in China, the U.S., Indonesia and Russia. The story appeared on more than 500 online sites, and the package received more than 100,000 page views on AP News. https://bit.ly/3htDPOG

Beat of the Week

(Honorable Mention)

No Canada: Blue Jays barred from playing in Toronto

broke the unexpected news that the Blue Jays were not allowed to play their games in Toronto amid the coronavirus pandemic, due to concerns over players traveling to and from the U.S. Gillies worked his sources, with one of them informing him of the decision moments after government officials ended their call with team management. Blue Jays players no doubt learned of the news from AP. Other news media used, credited and quoted the AP scoop. https://bit.ly/2E9mEns

Beat of the Week

(Honorable Mention)

All-formats team leads coverage of violent Belgrade protests

delivered dominant coverage as Serbia witnessed its most aggressive anti-government protests in years, triggered by new lockdown restrictions in response to a spike in coronavirus cases. Through three days and nights of protests and rioting, AP outdistanced its nearest competition in all formats and at virtually every turn. Visual coverage particularly stood out, with photos and video getting strong play. On both Wednesday and Friday of the protests AP was not only first with video edits, it had hours of compelling live coverage; the opposition had none.https://bit.ly/394GrzUhttps://bit.ly/2ZvllYchttps://bit.ly/2ZytQlchttps://bit.ly/2OJeZ1jhttps://bit.ly/3935Eue

Best of the Week — First Winner

Houston team vividly documents the grim reality playing out inside a Texas hospital

With coronavirus cases surging in Texas and other states, AP journalists David J. Phillip, John Mone and Nomaan Merchant went beyond the daily numbers to show the reality inside a small Houston hospital. In a gut-punch story that landed in newspapers and on nightly newscasts, the trio’s work included the last moments of a woman’s losing battle with the coronavirus.

But the package – Phillip’s photos, Mone’s video and Merchant’s text story – captured more than just a moment. It showed, with sensitivity, the grim realities almost certainly facing frontline workers in hospitals around the country.

Reaction to the story was massive. It was widely used in all formats by broadcast, print and online outlets in the U.S. and beyond. The video alone was the most-used U.S. story of the day – to a degree rarely seen.

For compelling, empathetic and revelatory storytelling from the frontline of the coronavirus fight, Phillip, Mone and Merchant win AP’s Best of the Week award.