The Walkley Awards are Australia’s most prestigious media accolades, celebrating excellence in journalism, photography, non-fiction literature and film.
The Walkley Awards were founded by Ampol Petroleum’s Sir William Gaston Walkley in 1956, with just five categories. William Walkley appreciated the media’s support for his oil exploration efforts and envisaged awards that recognised emerging talent in the Australian media.
Over the years the number of Awards grew organically, with categories created to reflect new media formats. The last few years has seen the expansion of the Walkley Awards program to recognise excellence in the growing area of long-form journalism with the the Walkley Book Award and Walkley Award for Excellence in Documentary Making.
WikiLeaks' Assange awarded at Walkleys
Assange, whose pre-recorded acceptance speech was played at the award ceremony held at Brisbane and later broadcast on SBS ONE, blasted the US and Australian governments for their ongoing “war against the truth”.In the six-minute-plus speech he was particularly scathing towards Prime Minister Julia Gillard.
“The Gillard government has shown its true colours in relation to how it’s handled US pressure on WikiLeaks,” he said.
“Australian journalists are courageous, the Australian population is supportive, but Julia Gillard is a cowardly Australian Prime Minister.
“As Australians we shall not despair, as long as we can speak out, as long as we can publish, and as long as the Internet remains free, we will continue to fight back, armed with the truth.”
Assange said the work of WikiLeaks had resulted in powerful enemies, but also revealed good friends.
“It has bought out the best in people – courage, loyalty, compassion and strength,” he said.
No comments:
Post a Comment