Tehran bureau chief Parisa Hafezi wins top award for media women

Reuters Tehran bureau chief Parisa Hafezi (photo)​, has won this year's International Women's Media Foundation award for courage in journalism.

It honours “extraordinary women journalists from around the world for demonstrating extraordinary strength and determination in pursuing their profession under difficult or dangerous circumstances”. Recipients have often jeopardised their personal safety and careers in the service of freedom, democracy and human rights.

As the first Iranian bureau chief working for foreign media in Tehran and the only non-westerner and female Reuters bureau chief in the Middle East, Hafezi has led successful efforts to improve the situation of Reuters in a country where authorities considered the organisation as “the Zionist news agency”.

She joined Reuters in 2000 as a part-time stringer in Tehran, becoming a staff correspondent in 2003, deputy bureau chief in 2007 and bureau chief in 2009. Previously she had worked for nearly two decades with foreign news organisations including Italian news agency ANSA and Turkish news channel NTV. She and her team were nominated for a Pulitzer prize in 2009.

Hafezi is a metallurgy engineering graduate from the Middle East Technical University in Turkey. She has two daughters. 

The IWMF prize comprises $5,000 and a crystal sculpture symbolising freedom and courage. It will be presented at ceremonies in Los Angeles and New York in October.

Displaying courage in journalism: meet Parisa Hafezi, Iran bureau chief ■