LONDON: Lebanese daily newspaper Annahar has been awarded the “Brave Brand” award by The Advertising Club of New York for the second consecutive year.
The leading Beirut-based newspaper was recognized for its Newspapers Inside The Newspaper campaign, an initiative that revived six defunct Lebanese newspapers for a day to bring back voices that once championed press freedom.
The campaign aimed to highlight the deteriorating state of press freedom in the country, which has struggled with economic hardship and political instability.
“In a world where truth can be elusive, we believe it’s our duty to seek it out, to tell the stories that matter and to stand firm in the face of hardship,” said Nayla Tueni, Annahar’s CEO and editor-in-chief, in a video published on the newspaper’s social channels.
Each spread of the revived newspapers featured original journalists and allowed them to write without fear of persecution, symbolizing a stand for free expression.
Tueni, who took over Annahar after her father, Gebran Tueni, was assassinated in 2005, said the campaign came during a particularly difficult period for Lebanon. Amid the ongoing economic crisis and the escalating Israeli-Hezbollah conflict, she said, the newspaper’s commitment to free press remained unwavering.
The award-winning campaign, launched on Dec. 12, 2022, was also a tribute to her father’s legacy as a fierce advocate for a free press in Lebanon.
Tueni said it “celebrates the boldness to break new ground” and served as a “testament to our resilience and unwavering commitment to our mission.”
Annahar recently announced a shift toward a “digital first” strategy, transforming itself into what Tueni called a “viewspaper” that focused on modernizing its approach while continuing to uphold the principles of free journalism.
