Television - Television News Reporting - Winner

Brian Thomson, World News Australia, SBS TV, "Timor in Transition"

Brian Thomson made four trips to East Timor between April and August this year, accompanied by cameraman/editor Ryan Sheridan.
In all they filed 28 stories, covering everything from the presidential election and its fallout, to the fledgling nation’s economic struggles and resource issues.

Thomson worked under intense time pressures in a country still racked with volatility. In some cases, Thomson and Sheridan were the only international crew on the ground; this was the case on their last trip to East Timor when they visited the Fretilin stronghold of Baucau.

In an outburst of post-election violence, more than 100 houses had been set alight in Baucau while Thomson was there. A UN convoy was also attacked and shot at, and a number of young girls attacked at a Catholic-run orphanage.
Thomson has been a journalist for 18 years. He began his career in local radio in Scotland before becoming the Scotland correspondent for Sky News.

Since moving to Australia in 1997, he has been employed by SBS as both a chief producer and senior reporter.

Reporting is Thomson’s first love – he was one of the youngest journalists to cover the first Gulf War in 1990. Since then he has reported from Indonesia, Cambodia, Thailand, Fiji, East Timor, Romania, Germany and France.

Judges’ comments

Covering political events in East Timor is a difficult brief for any reporter. There are the technical difficulties of operating in a Third World country, the highly complex political situation and the challenge of covering the impact of the political upheavals on the populace.

Thomson managed to tick all the boxes and told great yarns.

Particularly impressive was his report from Baucau, where his was the only international TV crew on the ground when hundreds of houses were torched in the violence following the elections.