The One Young World Journalist of the Year Award was created in 2020 to recognise ground-breaking journalists under the age of 35 from around the world. Launched again this year, it continues to celebrate courageous young leaders who have shown considerable commitment to inspiring and empowering others through their work, and changing the way stories are reported in often turbulent journalistic landscapes.
The expert judging panel has been invited by One Young World to choose three winners who have created meaningful global impact through exceptionally crafted reporting and who are passionate about the rights to freedom of thought, expression and speech.
The judges for the 2024 award are:
Ilia Calderón
lia Calderón is co-anchor of Univision Network’s flagship weekday evening newscast, “Noticiero Univision,” anchors Univision’s primetime newsmagazine, “Aquí y Ahora,” and in July 2023 became host of the streaming true crime show “Señales de Crimen” on ViX.
Calderón is the first Afro-Latina anchoring an evening newscast for a major broadcast network in the United States. She previously made a similar milestone in her native Colombia as the first Afro-Colombian to host a national news program in that country: “Noticiero CMI.”
Before joining “Noticiero Univision” in 2017, she was co-anchor of Univision’s “Noticiero Univision Edición Nocturna”, previously she was co-anchor of Univision’s “Primer Impacto” (First Impact) and served as co-anchor of the weekend edition, “Primer Impacto Fin de Semana.”
Prior to joining Univision, Calderón co-anchored Telemundo’s weekend national newscast as well as Telemundo Internacional. In her career she has interviewed numerous prominent politicians and celebrities, among them President Joe Biden, First Lady Jill Biden, Vice President Kamala Harris, former Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton, former Colombian president Álvaro Uribe, and singer/songwriter Shakira. She has also moderated presidential debates with candidates in both GOP and Democratic parties.
Calderón also drew headlines pressing Ku Klux Klan leader Christopher Barker on his controversial positions while she faced racial slurs and threats. After that interview she told Forbes: “As a journalist working for Univision, we have bigger responsibilities now in this country when racism and discrimination are coming to the surface. My role as a black Hispanic immigrant will be to scrutinize who’s in power and to be more vigilant of civil and human rights for all our viewers.”
Born in El Chocó, Colombia, Calderón began her career in 1994 anchoring a local newscast in the country’s second largest city, Medellín. Three years later she became the anchor of a highly respected nightly national newscast and a travel program, roles she held until she moved to the United States in 2001. As a respected journalist, Calderón has received several recognitions during her professional career, including two Emmy® Awards. In 2019, she was named one of Carnegie Corporation’s Great Immigrants Great Americans. In 2002, she was named one of the 100 most important Hispanic journalists by the Hispanic Media 100 organization. She was also nominated for a Peabody Award for the border crisis coverage on Aquí y Ahora.
Calderón also serves as President and Founder of the Jang-Calderon Family Foundation which has a mission to help underprivileged youth and guide them to achieve successful professional careers. She is also a One Young World Counsellor and has participated and moderated several panels during the past annual Summits. In addition, she has also been invited to speak at university and corporate events to discuss topics such as social justice and racism. In 2020 Calderon published her first book, “My Time to Speak: Reclaiming Ancestry and Confronting Race,” an inspiring, timely, and conversation-starting memoir.
Lyse Doucet
Lyse Doucet is a Canadian journalist who is the BBC’s Chief International Correspondent. She is regularly deployed to anchor news coverage from the field and report across the BBC’s domestic and global channels. Lyse first spent 15 years as a BBC foreign correspondent with postings in Jerusalem, Amman, Tehran, Islamabad, Kabul and Abidjan. In recent years she has spent much of her time in Ukraine reporting on Russia’s full-scale invasion, in Israel covering the Israel-Gaza war, and in Afghanistan following what life is like since the Taliban return.
Lyse was awarded an OBE in the Queen’s 2014 honours list for her services to broadcasting and was invested in the Order of Canada in 2019 for her “empathetic coverage of world events.” Last year she became a fellow, FRSGS, of the Royal Scottish Geographical Society. Lyse has a Master’s degree in International Relations from the University of Toronto, a BA Hons from Queen’s University, and 20 honorary doctorates from leading British and Canadian universities.
Lyse is a senior fellow of Massey College at the University of Toronto, an honorary patron of Canadian Crossroads International, a trustee of Friends of Aschiana UK, which supports street children in Afghanistan, and a founding member of the Marie Colvin Journalists’ Network, which supports Arab women journalists in the Middle East.
Her journalism has been recognised by major media and charity awards. Past awards include a Sony Gold for Radio News Journalist of the Year, a TV Emmy for the BBC’s reporting from Syria, a Peabody for Afghanistan reporting, and the Columbia Journalism Lifetime Achievement Award. Previous documentaries, including Children of Syria and Children of the Gaza War, were both nominated for BAFTAs. Most recently, in 2022, Lyse was awarded the Hay Festival Medal for Journalism and the 2021 Broadcast Journalist of the Year by the London Press Club. She was part of the BBC team, which won this year’s Royal Television Award (RTS) for International News Coverage for reporting from Ukraine.
Nima Elbagir
Nima Elbagir is CNN's multi-award winning Chief International Investigative Correspondent. She joined CNN in 2011 as a Johannesburg-based correspondent before moving to the network's Nairobi bureau and later London, where she is currently based.
Elbagir’s reporting on human rights abuses have been directly and extensively referenced by lawmakers including her investigations on the conflict in Ethiopia's northern Tigray region, which recently won an Emmy Award. She has been a crucial component of some of CNN’s most high-profile international reports, including exposing Iran’s systemic sexual violence against anti-regime protesters and use of secret torture centers to crush uprising, unraveling the shootings at the Lekki toll gate in Nigeria, the use of child labour in cobalt mines in the Democratic Republic of the Congo and the discovery of slave auctions in Libya which sparked global outcry.
Among her honors, Elbagir has been named the Royal Television Society 'Television Journalist of the Year' and received the prestigious Alfred I. duPont-Columbia University Award in 2019, with the jurors citing her "fearless reporting across Africa, from a modern-day slave market in Libya, to child labor in Congo, and a smuggler's network in Nigeria, documented rarely seen exploitation and corruption."
Before joining CNN, Sudanese-born Elbagir worked in various capacities for the UK's Channel 4 for a number of years starting in 2005.