Myanmar Now

Myanmar Now (Burmese: မြန်မာနောင်း) is a news agency based in Myanmar (Burma). Myanmar Now journalists publish bilingual Burmese and English articles on an eponymous online news portal. The agency provides free syndication throughout the country, with a distribution network of over 50 national and local media outlets that regularly republish its stories.[1] As of September 2019, Myanmar Now had a readership of over 350,000, and a team of 30 journalists.[2] The news service is noted for its in-depth reporting on high-impact issues, including corruption, child labor, human rights, and social justice.[3][4]

Myanmar Now
Native name
မြန်မာနောင်း
IndustryNews agency
FoundedAugust 2015 (August 2015)
Headquarters
Pabedan Township, Yangon
,
Myanmar
Area served
Myanmar
Key people
Swe Win, Editor-in-Chief
Number of employees
30 (2019)
Websitewww.myanmar-now.org

History

Myanmar Now was established by the Thomson Reuters Foundation in 2015 to support in-depth independent journalism, in the lead-up to the 2015 Myanmar general election.[1] The news service officially launched in August of that year.[5] The agency is led by Swe Win, its chief correspondent and editor-in-chief.[1] Its founding chief correspondent was Thin Lei Win, a Reuters journalist.[6] Since the inception of the news service, several Myanmar Now journalists, including Swe Win, have been threatened and assaulted by military and legal authorities for their work.[7][8][9]

After the 2021 Myanmar coup d'état, the military junta cracked down on independent journalism in the country.[10] Authorities detained Myanmar Now journalists, including Kay Zone Nwe.[11][10] On 8 March 2021, soldiers raided the Myanmar Now headquarters, before the military junta revoked operating licenses of Myanmar Now and four other media outlets, namely Mizzima, Democratic Voice of Burma (DVB), Khit Thit Media, and 7Day News, amidst the ongoing protests.[12]

Awards

In 2016, Htet Khaung Lin, a Myanmar Now journalist, was awarded the European Commission's Lorenzo Natali Media Prize, for a piece on underage sex workers in Myanmar.[1][13]

That same year, it received an honorable mention in the Society of Publishers in Asia Awards for investigative reporting, namely a piece on the 969 Movement.[14][1]

In 2019, Swe Win won the Ramon Magsaysay Award for Emergent Leadership, for his leadership in fostering journalistic integrity and quality in Myanmar as Myanmar Now's editor-in-chief.[3][15]

In a group with other collaborating news organizations, Myanmar Now was awarded an Online Journalism Award for "2020 Excellence in Collaboration and Partnerships", specifically for reporting on pangolins.[16]

In June 2022, Frontier Myanmar won the SOPA Award for Excellence in Human Rights Reporting for "Human responses to the junta’s cruelty.’’[17]

See also

References
  1. "Myanmar Now". Thomson Reuters Foundation. Retrieved 2021-02-05.
  2. "'Truth, justice, love': Ko Swe Win on journalism in times of repression". Rappler. Retrieved 2021-02-05.
  3. "Myanmar Now Editor-in-Chief Awarded Asia's Highest Honor". The Irrawaddy. 2019-08-02. Retrieved 2021-02-05.
  4. "Myanmar journalist Swe Win one of the winners of the Ramon Magsaysay Award". Mizzima. 30 August 2019.
  5. Clark, Helen. "An Independent News Site for Myanmar". thediplomat.com. Retrieved 2021-02-05.
  6. "Thin Lei Win, Myanmar Now: 'We're not going to shy away from controversial topics'". Frontier Myanmar. 2015-09-02. Retrieved 2021-02-05.
  7. "Myanmar Now Reporters Threatened With Arrest by Military". The Irrawaddy. 2018-06-25. Retrieved 2021-02-05.
  8. "Myanmar Now Journalist Assaulted". The Irrawaddy. 2017-03-15. Retrieved 2021-02-05.
  9. "Investigation into shooting attack on Myanmar journalist goes nowhere | Reporters without borders". RSF. 2020-12-02. Retrieved 2021-02-05.
  10. Spicer, Sarah (2022-12-14). "Myanmar's jailing of journalists enters harsh new phase". Committee to Protect Journalists. Retrieved 2023-03-30.
  11. Paddock, Richard C. (2021-04-01). "Myanmar Soldiers, Aiming to Silence Protests, Target Journalists". The New York Times. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved 2023-03-30.
  12. "Myanmar: military revokes licences of five media outlets in blow to press freedom". The Guardian. Retrieved 9 March 2021.
  13. "Myanmar journalist wins international award". The Myanmar Times. 2016-02-03. Retrieved 2021-02-05.
  14. "The SOPA 2016 Awards for Editorial Excellence Awards Winners List" (PDF). The Society of Publishers in Asia.
  15. "Ko Swe Win". The Ramon Magsaysay Award Foundation. 2019.
  16. "The Pangolin Reports". Retrieved 4 February 2021.
  17. "SOPA Announces Winners of 2022 Awards for Editorial Excellence". Yahoo!. Retrieved 2023-03-30.
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