Paris, March 12 (No.2001-39) - The 2001 UNESCO/Guillermo Cano World Press Freedom Prize was awarded today to U Win Tin, presently serving a prison sentence in Rangoon (Myanmar), by UNESCO Director-General Koïchiro Matsuura on the recommendation of an international jury of 16 media professionals.

This year’s laureate, U Win Tin - former editor of the daily Hanthawati newspaper in Myanmar, vice-chair of Myanmar’s Writers’ Association and a founder of the National League for Democracy - was arrested in July 1989. Three months later, accused of being a member of the banned Communist Party of Myanmar, he was sentenced to 14 years in prison and transported to Insein jail in Rangoon. In 1996, U Win Tin was tried in prison and sentenced to an additional five years for breaking prison regulations prohibiting the possession of writing materials. Later that year he was moved to Myingyan jail north of Rangoon, where his family and friends could no longer visit him or send him food and medicine. In early October 1997, he was transferred to Rangoon General Hospital, where he remains and is reported to be seriously ill. His prison sentence will only end in July 2008, unless he renounces all political activities, which he refuses to do.

As it announced its choice, the jury expressed concern for the laureate and hoped that steps will be taken to secure his release. The Chairperson of the jury, Oliver Clarke, also voiced grave concern about Nizar Nayyouf, the 2000 laureate of the UNESCO/Guillermo Cano World Press Freedom Prize, who has been in jail in Syria since 1992. Mr Nayyouf is reported to be seriously ill and to be deprived of medical treatment. “We are deeply concerned for the very survival of Nizar Nayyouf. We understand that his condition has deteriorated and that his life is in danger”, Mr Clarke said.

The jury issued a statement saying: “We, the members of the jury, hereby kindly request the Director-General of UNESCO to continue his efforts and discussions with the Syrian authorities so that a solution can be reached for the release of Mr Nayyouf on humanitarian grounds.”

The Prize has been named after Colombian journalist and editor Guillermo Cano, who was assassinated while attempting to report on the activities of drug barons in his country. The US$25,000 prize is awarded yearly on the recommendation of an independent jury of 16 news professionals from all regions of the world. Their meeting was chaired by Oliver Clarke, Chairman of the Gleaner Group, of Jamaica, who succeeds Belgian journalist Mia Doornaert, President of UNESCO’s Advisory Group for Press Freedom and former President of the International Federation of Journalists (IFJ). The Prize will be presented on May 3, on the occasion of World Press Freedom Day.

World Press Freedom Day and the UNESCO/Guillermo Cano Prize are part of UNESCO’s mission to support the free flow of information and promote press freedom, media independence and pluralism. Created in 1997 by UNESCO’s Executive Board, the Prize each year honours a person, organization or institution that has made a notable contribution to the defence and/or promotion of press freedom anywhere in the world, especially if this involves risk.

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