On September 13 at the Global Investigative Journalism Conference in Lillehammer,
Norway, the winners of the Global Shining Light Award-2008 were announced. The
winner of the first prize was journalist from Sri Lanka Sonali Samarasinghe.
The second place was taken by the Chairman of “Investigative Journalists” NGO,
the Chief Editor of “Hetq” online publication Edik Baghdasarian. The
Armenian journalist was awarded for the cycle of articles, published in “Hetq”
in 2007, devoted to the activities of the then RA Minister of Nature Protection
Vardan Ayvazian, who issued his family and staff licenses to develop over a
dozen of mines, most of which held gold or polymetallic resources.
The Global Shining Light Award was established in 2007 for investigative journalists
of developing or transitional countries that reported under threat, duress or
in the direst of conditions.
