JMSC undergraduate wins Human Rights Press Award for second year running

Martin Choi, a third-year Bachelor of Journalism student at the JMSC, has won the University English-Language Broadcast Prize at this year’s Human Rights Press Awards.

It is the second year in a row that a JMSC undergraduate has won an award in one of the university student categories.

The winners of the 21st Human Rights Press Awards were announced during a ceremony at the Foreign Correspondents’ Club (FCC) in Hong Kong on Saturday 13 May.

Choi won for his piece titled “Seeking Refuge in Lesvos,” which he wrote and produced videos for with Christoph Donauer for Mediajungle.dk, an online news platform run by the Danish School of Media and Journalism.

“We tried publishing our story through international media outlets but they all told us they had too many stories about refugees,” said Choi. “But the situation on the island is still far from being resolved. I’m glad we got this award, and I hope that it will raise more awareness about the on-going plight of refugees on Lesvos. I had the time of my life uncovering this story, and I hope to be able to do more stories like this in the future.”

JMSC Director Keith Richburg and Martin Choi, 3rd year BJ student.

JMSC alum Jun Mai (MJ 2010) also picked up a Merit recognition in the English Spot News category for his work on “Wukan series: Wukan riots” with Mimi Lau for the South China Morning Post.

The Human Rights Press Awards are jointly organised by the FCC, the Hong Kong Journalists Association and Amnesty International Hong Kong.

The JMSC is the administrator of the awards, but does not participate in the judging and has no influence over the results.

Click here for the full list of this year’s winners.