SBS Dateline | Young Journalist Awards

Dateline video journalist Sophie McNeill has won one of this year’s Walkley Young Australian Journalist of the Year Awards.

Afghanistan’s Shame, broadcast in August last year, gave a harrowing account of the abuse and discrimination facing women in Afghanistan. It won the award in the TV category, and was described by the judges as 'an original story sensitively told'.

Her entry also included another recent story from Afghanistan... Questions from Oruzgan investigated the killing of four children, a teenager and an adult by Australian soldiers. Her report, broadcast in March, prompted the issue to be raised in the Senate.

Sophie also won a Young Australian Journalist of the Year Award in 2008 for her investigative report from Gaza on the Palestinian civil war, Palestine: Divided It Falls.

Another SBS journalist, Yaara Bou Melhem, was also a finalist this year for her stories on asbestos pollution in Wallaga Lake for Living Black.

Yaara had earlier reported for Dateline from Jordan with the story Jailing the Innocent, which gave a rare glimpse inside a prison in which women were being held for years to prevent them from being murdered in 'honour killings'.

Yaara won the TV award last year, meaning that SBS has won every year since the awards were introduced.

They recognise the work of journalists aged 26 and under. The winners were announced at an award ceremony in Sydney on 23rd June 2010.