US: Wall Street Journal wins top Pulitzer prizes

Journal awarded for coverage of China's economic development, corporate America scandal

Times of India
Tuesday, April 17, 2007

New York --- The Wall Street Journal picked up two top Pulitzer prizes on Monday for its coverage of fast-paced economic development in China and a share-dealing scandal that led to changes in corporate America.

The Journal was awarded the public service prize for its "creative and comprehensive probe" into back-dated stock options for US business executives.

The newspaper's coverage "triggered investigations, the ouster of top officials and widespread change in corporate America," the Pulitzer Prize committee said in a statement.

The paper also walked away with the international reporting award for its "sharply edged reports on the adverse impact of China's booming capitalism on conditions ranging from inequality to pollution," the committee said.

The annual US awards for print journalism were unveiled at Columbia University in New York. The Prizes are each worth 10,000 dollars, except the public service award, which is a gold medal.

The New York Times won the editorial writing prize for its opinion pieces on behalf of workers who toiled through the wreckage of the World Trade Center after the September 11 attacks of 2001.

The breaking news photography prize went to Oded Balilty of The Associated Press for a powerful photograph of a lone Jewish woman defying Israeli security forces as they removed illegal settlers in the West Bank.

The committee also credited an Iranian journalist with a prize-winning photograph of a firing squad taken a quarter century ago and initially published anonymously.

Jahangir Razmi's iconic picture of the execution of a group of 11 prisoners won the 1980 Pulitzer Prize for Spot News Photography but Razmi was only identified as the man behind the image last year.

The Pulitzer prize for fiction meanwhile went to Cormac McCarthy for the novel "The Road," an account of a father and son's journey through a post-Apocalyptic America.

Date Posted: 4/17/2007