Syrian journalist wins Unesco World Press Freedom Prize

Syrian journalist and human rights activist Mazen Darwish, currently incarcerated in Syria, was honoured on Friday with the Unesco Guillermo Cano World Press Freedom Prize for 2015.

An international independent jury of media professionals decided to award the Unesco prize to the human rights activist as an acknowledgement of his professional career, more than a decade of "personal sacrifice" in which he suffered harassment, incessant arrests, torture and travel bans, Efe news agency reported.

Darwish is the president of the Syrian Centre for Media and Freedom of Expression (CMFE), founded in 2004, and one of the founders of the Voice newspaper and the syriaview.net independent news website, which has been banned by Syrian authorities.

He has been detained since February 2012 with two of his colleagues, while several human rights organisations and the UN have called for his release.

Created by Unesco's Executive Board in 1997, the annual Unesco Guillermo Cano World Press Freedom Prize was named in honour of Guillermo Cano Isaza, a Colombian journalist who was assassinated in Bogota on December 17, 1986, by drug cartels operating in the Latin American country.

The $25,000 prize money is awarded to a person, organisation or institution that has made an outstanding contribution to the defence or promotion of press freedom anywhere in the world, especially in the face of danger.