UNCA Member, Shoichiro Beppu, and the bureau chief of the NHK/UN bureau, won the 2007 Vaughn-Uyeda Prize in journalism! (Japan's equivalent of the Pulitzer Prize)

Sho and the NHK bureau in Cairo last year also won the UNCA Awards' Gold Medal for the Ricardo Ortega Memorial Prize for Broadcast Journalism. Warmest Congratulations to Sho and NHK!

TOKYO, Feb. 25 (AP) - (Kyodo)-Shoichiro Beppu, a reporter at public broadcaster NHK's America General Bureau in New York, was chosen Monday as the recipient of the 2007 Vaughn-Uyeda Prize for contributions made by Japanese journalists in the field of international affairs.

Beppu, 37, was recognized for a series of reports he wrote chiefly on issues in the Middle East and Africa -- regions scarcely covered by the Japanese media -- including battlefield situations in Iraq, Sudan and Somalia, while working at NHK's Cairo bureau from 2003 to June last year.

He also wrote about a boat that was smuggling migrants from Senegal to Europe and a story based on an exclusive interview with Syrian President Bashar al-Assad.

The prize is often described as Japan's version of the Pulitzer Prize.

Joining NHK, officially named Japan Broadcasting Corp., in 1994, Beppu was first assigned to its Nara bureau and transferred to the News Department's International News section before being assigned to Cairo and New York.