Prize-Winning Jiji Journalist Eager to Continue Arctic Coverage

Yokohama, March 23 (Jiji Press)--Ryota Dei of Jiji Press expressed his desire to continue reporting on the Arctic Circle after winning the Vaughn-Uyeda Memorial International Journalistic Prize for fiscal 2024 for his field coverage in the region.

Giving a lecture in Yokohama, south of Tokyo, on Saturday, Dei, a 47-year-old senior staff writer in the foreign news department at Jiji Press, also explained about the divisions in the Arctic Circle resulting from Russia's invasion of Ukraine as well as the struggle for hegemony there among major powers.

Dei conducted news gathering activities in the Norwegian territory of Svalbard and other places in the Arctic in May and June 2024. In August and September of the same year, he participated in an Arctic Ocean observation mission led by the Japan Agency for Marine-Earth Science and Technology, or JAMSTEC, aboard the oceanographic research ship Mirai. He reported on the competition for natural resources and the effects of global warming.

Dei pointed out that multilateral cooperation in the Arctic "has collapsed with Russia's invasion of Ukraine." He noted that the Svalbard archipelago is now at the "forefront of great power competition."

Yumiko Kurashige, 42, of the Yomiuri Shimbun daily, who received the same prize for her on-the-ground reporting in Ukraine during the invasion, also gave a lecture, saying, "Tragedies and cries of the people and war crimes must not be ignored."

[Copyright The Jiji Press, Ltd.]