Saddam Hussein's Information Minister Mohammed Saeed al-Sahaf and the US Secretary of Defence, Donald Rumsfeld have been jointly awarded the Gold Orwellian International Prize by the Media Alliance, the IFJ affiliate in Australia.
The awards were given in recognition of violations of the media both in Australia and around the world in the past year and were announced in conjunction with World Press Freedom Day.
"While the awards gives us a chance to laugh at our tormentors we also need to remember that in many ways the past 12 months has been dismal for press freedom. Most notably with the deaths of our colleagues in Iraq," said the federal secretary of the Alliance, Christopher Warren.
The Australian prize in the anti-press freedom awards went to Immigration Minister Phillip Ruddock. (May 12)