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Lyra McKee award for bravery goes to Salma Niazi from Afghanistan
THE WINNER of the 2025 One Young World Lyra McKee Award for Bravery is Salma Niazi, for her work reporting on the rights of women in Afghanistan. She said: “Lyra McKee stood for truth and fearlessness, and receiving an award in her name reminds me that journalism can give hope even in the darkest moments. It motivates me to keep telling stories that need to be heard.”
Salma Niazi
Sadly, this award came days before the authorities in Afghanistan started cutting almost all internet connections. This is further hindering freedom of reporting and women's access to information and online tuition. Women had already been excluded from in-person education.
The award is given in memory of Lyra McKee, who was shot on the night of 18 April 2019 while covering rioting in Derry, Northern Ireland.
This is the photo that Lyra McKee supplied to Forbes magazine when it declared her one of its 30 under 30 in media in 2016.
Lyra's sister Nichola Corner told BBC Northern Ireland that many people do not realise the impact deaths like Lyra's can have on families: “That's why the work of journalists who are out there telling the stories of the unnecessary deaths of civilians is so important. Because I know how every one of those people feel.”
Last year's award went to Plestia Alaqad, a journalist from Gaza.
We await news of the winners of the Lyra McKee Bursary Scheme 2025.
Meanwhile the Daily Record reports that one of the three men on trial for Lyra's murder took part in a Republican parade in Glasgow, Scotland, in August. Jordan Devine was pictured with a large drum at the rally by the Irish Republican Prisoner Welfare Association, which the paper alleged to be an offshoot of Saoradh, the political wing of banned terror group the New IRA, which issued a statement taking responsibility for Lyra's death.
So far as the Freelance can tell the trial of Devine, alongside Peter Cavanagh and Paul McIntyre, remained stalled. Six others face charges including rioting and throwing petrol bombs.
RIP Lyra McKee April 2019