The George Polk Awards, run by Long Island University, announced the winners of its 63rd event today.
According to a release the New York Times won two of the 15 categories. The first, for military reporting, was awarded to CJ Chivers, and the second was the foreign reporting prize which went to Jeffrey Gettleman and Tyler Hicks for their “numerous exclusives and heart-wrenching photos of ethnic conflict, pillage, famine and piracy”.
It was also announced that Anthony Shadid, the New York Times foreign correspondent who died from an apparent asthma attack in Syria last week, will receive a posthumous award “for extraordinary valor for his work in the Middle East”.
Other winners include the Wall Street Journal, the Associated Press, the New Yorker and the Boston Globe.
“There was a strong field of contenders this year, especially in investigative work,” said John Darnton, curator of the George Polk Awards. “It was a big year for news with the Arab Spring and the Japanese earthquake and tsunami, and reporters from many news organizations went behind the headlines to search for underlying causes and trends.”