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Thank you, ladies and gentlemen, dear guests, journalists and students, Youth for Regions alumni, current participants and finalists,

a very warm welcome to all of you who came today and a special welcome to the families of Antonio Fumagalli and Bartek Orent Najewski.

My name is Thea Mikhanovic, and it is a great pleasure to welcome all of you here on this very special occasion.

It is the 2026th edition of the Megaliz.

The Najolski Awards ceremony, which also marks the 10th anniversary of the Youth for Regions program for aspiring journalists.

Please, a round of applause for all the people who have been making sure to keep this project alive and working very hard for 10 years.

Standing here in front of you today for me has a deep personal meaning because 7 years ago I was standing on this very same stage as a very,

very shy student and I received the first Megalii Najolski Award in 2019.

Nowadays, when I When I wake up, I see the award standing on my shelf,

and it really motivated me a lot through the last 7 years.

I kept pushing through and I kept finding my own voice,

and today I am a TV news reporter and a TV presenter at RTL Television Croatia,

so it meant a lot to me.

I hope that it's also going to mean a lot to the lovely young people,

the participants of the Youth for Regions program who gathered here today.

So this was a short glimpse into my own journey, but behind every individual effort there is always a bigger collective effort.

To speak about this,

it is my great pleasure to invite the Director General of the European Commission's Department for Regional and Urban Policy,

Ms Themis Christophidou. Welcome. The stage is yours. Thank you there. I may sit however you like it.

We've got a baby there where they start earlier and earlier. How old? A few months.

Almost 20, name Olivia, wonderful, it's very cute.

So I hope that she will be a candidate one day.

Tia family of António and Bartec Che family the António er Baste la lamamante Basteque devamoa. Dear guests and journalists, dear friends.

Welcome and thank you all for being with us this evening.

We are gathered for a joyful occasion once more.

Tonight we celebrate inspiring young journalists, young journalistic voices through the Megalizi Nielskiy Prize,

the centerpiece of the Youth for Regions program, which marks its 10th anniversary this year.

More than 400 aspiring journalists from the European Union,

accession countries and neighboring countries applied for this year's Youth for Regions program.

435 were selected to come to Brussels to learn, report,

and experience the EU from the inside, and 9 finalists will be with us tonight. Congratulations to you all.

You represent the next generation of European journalism,

and in many ways you can carry forward the passion of António and Bartnik.

This prize is named after them, not only as a tribute to their dedication,

but also as a call to uphold their commitment to courageous journalism rooted in European values.

António and Bartek were young journalists who believed deeply in the power of words,

ideas and honest reporting to bring people together.

They understood that journalism is not simply about telling stories, but it's about helping people understand the world around them,

about asking difficult questions and about giving citizens the information they need to participate actively in democratic life.

Bartek and Antonio's lives were cruelly cut short, but their ideas persist.

They persist in this prize and in the young journalists we recognize tonight.

At a time when public debate is increasingly shaped by polarization,

manipulation and mistrust, independent journalism and media freedom matter more than ever.

Journalists keep institutions accountable, they bring facts and perspectives into the public conversation,

they challenge assumptions and they thus strengthen democracy.

This is why the European Commission is committed to strengthening media freedom, independent journalism and media literacy.

The European Media Freedom Act, which has been in force since last year,

is an important step in protecting editorial independence, transparency and access to trustworthy information.

This is also why I'm particularly happy tonight to announce the opening of the 10th call for information measures for cohesion policy.

This call supports editorial independent journalistic projects that help citizens understand what cohesion policy means in their communities and how EU investment affects people's daily lives.

Across the previous 9 editions,

almost 1200 projects have been implemented in 24 of our member states.

This year we will again make EUR 3.5 million available to support quality journalism that brings the reality of cohesion policy closer to citizens.

Because a healthy democracy needs more than institutions, treaties and legislation,

it needs a public discourse, informed, open and accessible to everyone. Journalism is essential to that discourse.

This is why your work is so important.

So tonight we celebrate your talent, but we also celebrate your choice to become journalists,

to ask questions, to seek the truth.

Your work demonstrates that Europe matters in our daily life.

It should be explained, it should be questioned, it should be debated, and,

above all, it should be brought closer to citizens, especially to young people.

To the finalists and participants of Youth for Regions, your work is part of Antonio's and P's legacy.

The best way to honor their memory is to keep believing in what they believed in.

Journalism that is independent, that is curious, that is courageous, and that is close to people.

That is the spirit of this prize, and that is the spirit I hope you will all carry with you. Thank you.

Thank you very much, dear Director General, as you mentioned, there were 400 applications,

but only 9 finalists that we are going to see through the night.

Now it is time to meet some of the journalists, as you said, of the new generation.

Each one of them we will meet on the stage tonight is demonstrating the exceptional talent and values that António and Bartek stood for.

So, kick things off, I'm going to invite the first round of 3 finalists.

My GPT, and I have been have been struggling to find the pronunciations of all of your names,

so I apologize in advance if I pronounce any of them wrong, but I guess that's the beauty of the EU diversity.

So, please a round of applause for Léonie Hartke,

Tudor Mitrea Vieu, and Joanna Kaloyanova.

Welcome, and to kick things off, let's first introduce yourselves. I start, I guess. I'm Léonie Hartke. I'm 27 years old. I'm from Germany.

I work as a freelance reporter and editor mainly for the Nord Deutsche Rundfung, which is the public broadcasting in northern Germany.

Hi everyone, thanks so much for being here. I'm a tutor. I'm 22 years old.

I'm currently in university in Romania and I work for Deutsche Welle, a Romanian and European department. Thank you. Hello everyone, my name is Joanna Kaulannova. I am 24 years old.

I'm from Bulgaria and right now I'm doing a master's degree in journalism and globalization in Denmark. So no complaints about the pronunciations. Very warm welcome to all of you. Let's start with you, Léonie.

Your academic background is in psychology, as you said, with a specialization in political and social psychology.

So how do you apply this background to your reporting?

I think my studies really shaped how I view people and their opinions, like, we all, at least part of our opinion is shaped by the experience we have or the surroundings, the people that surround us or our geography,

and I feel like that I try to meet people where they are, like in German we would say on eye level,

on equal terms, and then I try to apply that to my understanding of their opinion and also of my own opinion.

You also created your own YouTube channel for the German, regional public broadcaster NDR.

It discusses regional issues of importance to all the young people in the northern Germany.

So,

could you tell us how you came up with the idea of creating YouTube series instead of maybe some traditional journalistic platforms?

So during my traineeship with the NAR, my colleague and me, Nathalie Cely and me, we, did the same traineeship and we got to know the channel in like a lot of different ways and we realized there's a lot of content for young people that is very centralized in like Berlin and Hamburg,

and there's a lot of content that is regional, but that's only on TV so we try to bring that together.

And give like young reporters that work in all our 16 regional studios all over northern Germany a platform.

So if all the German speakers studios Echin on YouTube you can watch if you want to a bit of unpaid promotion. Thank you. We continue with Tudor Mitrea.

You are in your 2nd year of communication.

Degree as you said, and you already work for Deutsche Welle, which is quite impressive. You work on their Facebook and TikTok.

So what, how would you relate to what Léonie said about online platforms and journalistic channels? Thank you for the question.

Yeah, I would say creating content for Facebook and TikTok, especially for, for Deutsche Welle.

It's really related to what social media means today, what journalism means today for us, and, we're trying to promote the journalist standards, the, valuable ones,

and where, one video lasts 30 seconds or 30 minutes, we should keep accuracy,

we should keep, sustainability, also,

other values that we can share, together.

And we're trying to promote really valuable content for the EU generation.

It's interesting that Tudor Mitrea is not a stranger to being nominated for prizes either,

because you and your team won the prize of European mobile journalism called Mojo Arena.

So it was about your documentary exploring the rights of migrants delivery men in Romania.

So could you share maybe one lesson that you learned from this valuable experience? Thank you for the question.

One lesson that I could say, it might be the power of listening, because while doing that documentary, we acknowledge that it's really important to listen to our society,

and we gave this chance to Mehdi, one delivery migrant that worked in Romania,

and we created a really interesting video, we learned really new things.

And we try to give visibility to voices that often go unheard, especially in our society. Thank you very much to Andrea. We continue with Joanna.

You seem to be a real creative Polly Valent.

Your submission to this competition was an audio report, but she also writes,

shoots and edits edits videos for your own YouTube channel.

So, how important is it for good journalists to push past their comfort zones, in your opinion,

and maybe do you have some tip that could be useful for all of us? Thank you you for the question.

As journalists, I would say we always try to push the limits of our comfort zones, trying to reach the people that might be hard to speak to and asking questions that might be difficult to ask,

but I think it's what's beautiful about this profession because it helps us to reach places which might otherwise remain unreachable.

As for advice, even for me, being here today on this stage is kind of going out of my comfort zone, so before I came up on stage,

I told myself a quote that I always say to myself when I'm very nervous, I need to do the scary thing first and get scared later.

I think no one would ever say that she was nervous. You, you're doing amazing.

And also all the work that she's doing, she's doing in 5 languages, which is quite impressive.

So, what do you think are the main challenges for journalists working in multiple languages at once,

and how do you switch your, to say, way of being as a journalist between working in different languages?

So the biggest challenge is obviously the fact that sometimes English might not be English, Spanish might not be Spanish,

sometimes you might need to ask for clarifications, which sometimes gets you to very interesting places because you learn things that you didn't know about.

So this is, I would say, probably the biggest challenge, but on the other hand, getting to talk to people in their native language many times opens a more intimate part of themselves and of their personality,

and I would say that it also shapes the journalists because it allows them this intimate look into people's souls.

It is great to have such a group of talents.

And now, the first of 3 moments that we are all waiting for tonight.

Dear Director General,

please could you release the candidates from the suspense and tell us who is the first Magalii Najowski Prize winner. Olivia is gone. Where is she?

So now the pron pronunciation challenge is there. And the winner is Joanna Kaloyanova. Congratulations, you deserved it.

Now I will actually thank all of you.

We will hear from our first winner later in the end.

Now thank you all, and you can go to your places.

You all did amazing and you deserved your prize. Dismissed. Happy to be dismissed.

So, without further ado, let's go to meet three more finalists.

A warm welcome to the stage to Elizabetta Andrukkova, Jean-Tonene Urbania, and Agnes Tarnocchi.

These are Please also welcome our second special guest from the Brussels bureau chief of the DPA,

the German news agency Ansgard Haa. OK. We will also hear from Ansgar later. For now, please introduce yourselves.

You can go in the same order or however you feel. Good evening, everyone.

My name is Lisa, which is a short form of my name, and it is easy to pronounce it.

I'm 21 and I work for a Ukrainian public broadcaster as an international journalist, international TV journalist. It is called Suspilna. You can go further. Girls first. My name is Daggash. I'm from Hungary.

I'm 23 years old and I work for a media outlet in Hungary called Javege while I finished my master's studies. Hi, my name is Jan.

I'm 28 years old and I work for the national, newspaper Swichrindweed. Very nice to meet all of you.

Now, we first go to Lisa, as you said, it's a bit more simple than Elizabeta, but it, in any case,

I see that you are quite a curious mind and that you really love learning because you already completed several Training programs only through this year.

She has been to Prague, to Milan, to Vilnius and Kev, and now you are in Brussels for another youth program.

Could you share one lesson that combines all of these programs that you learned and you would like to pass on? Yeah, thank you for the question.

I would say that the biggest lesson I've learned is the weight of, responsibility because these programs gave me, such an amazing tools and skills that I can use,

but, the main question is why I need these skills and the answer is to fight propaganda in,

in Ukraine.

And tell about Ukraine, tell the stories of Ukrainians,

which I consider one of the most important tasks for Ukrainians, for Ukrainian journalists right now.

Another lesson is that Facts do not really change something in people's minds,

but human stories do, and this is really important.

As a As you said, you are working for the international news desk at the National Public Broadcasting Company of Ukraine,

where you represent the voices of Ukrainians, which really is important, but you also run your own podcast.

Can you tell us a bit more about this project?

Yeah, of course, my podcast called Promojlivisti, which is translated as, about opportunities, and I started it, it is my,

university project, but then, I continued it, and,

the main topic and the main focus is, international opportunities for youth.

I can already call myself, an ambassador of such opportunities, and, these were one of the, like, most important decisions in my life and my goal is to tell about,

opportunities to study abroad or to do internships abroad,

to Ukrainian young people, so then can, bring this.

Back home and empower Ukrainian development and rebuilding in the future.

We go further to you, your first professional experiences in journalism started in sports reporting,

which is quite interesting because you're here today on the event of the European Commission.

You started to focus more on political and societal topics, but what lessons has sports reporting taught you?

Well, firstly, speed, absolutely, and to To really Look at the things that really matter,

so regarding sports it's probably similar, but yeah, it taught me that.

Where to look at, how to look at, and especially what's really important at the moment is decided in a second.

Even if you're on, at the National Assembly, if you're, in, in the sport event, it's pretty similar.

You also write for SVT 24 alongside your studies,

and you recently wrote an article on why influencers can earn political trust maybe even faster than journalists,

politicians, etc.

So what lessons can journalists take from influencers?

Well, yeah, I think influencing,

influencers became like an idols for many people, especially young people.

They can really come close to people, so people can, people look up to them, they,

they feel like they're a family, like they're parasocial,

Parasocially meaning, so journalists can Try and be.

As much as a friend as they can be, and they need to.

Touch the people in a way they would feel that, that you, they will trust you in a way that you are there that you are there for them,

you are there for them, not, and not vice vers vice vice versa. That's, thank you for the contribution.

It is important for journalists to keep on building trust with people nowadays in the challenging times.

Agnes, you used to write a monthly column on book recommendations, which is quite interesting.

So maybe which book recommendation would you, give to all of us?

Well, this is a tough question that I get quite often and especially with such a diverse audience,

this is a real challenge, but I think I will recommend something Hungarian.

I think it's really popular recently, Hungarian literature.

And there's a book called Oliver the 7th by Hungarian author Antas Serb.

It was written during the Second World War and it has a sort of escapist fantasy element. It it's really a short book. I think it's less than 200 pages. And it is a very European story.

It's about a king of a fictional European kingdom who is trying to escape his duties and has a series of adventures and misadventures, and it's really funny,

but on a deeper level,

I think it's really a story about growing up and about taking on our responsibilities and Meeting our fate.

So I, I guess I would recommend this to, to all of you.

You are also taking your own responsibilities through your current internship.

You participated in a project examining women's representation in journalism.

So what is one message maybe that you would like to share, share with us from that experience?

When we were working on this mini project,

we looked at women journalists and the subjects of journalism.

So sources, experts, even women's issues and of course there's still a long way to go to, to have an equal field in terms of female representation,

but I would say that my main message is that We should keep talking to each other.

We should have conversations and we should reach out because I think this night also shows that there is no lack of female talent in journalism and beyond.

So there are a lot of talented women who are more than willing to speak out and they're not that far away and I think it's our job as journalists and as active citizens to reach out. It's closer than you would think.

Thank you very much, Agnes, Jean, and Elizabeta.

We heard 3 voices, 3 powerful stories, but there's only place for one winner.

So Ansgar, please, could you briefly say your message to them and announce who is the winner. Thank you.

Dear finalists, dear colleagues, dear friends, it's a real honor to be here with you and to present this prize.

I will say a few words before what, what I think about journalism and the situation right now.

I think the future of journalism can look uncertain in these times,

but I started writing for a local newspaper in 1996 while I was still at school.

And when I began my traineeship 10 years later, people were already predicting the end of the daily newspapers.

I remember a cover, a front page of The Economist saying, who killed the newspapers?

But now, 20 years later, The Economist and the daily newspapers are still there.

A lot of things changed, and I think the way we read and share news has changed enormously.

But the need to understand what is happening, in my opinion,

has only grown and The tools have changed, but our task has not.

And today we talk a lot of AI.

It can help us search, translate, and analyze huge amount of information and it's changing our world and our work,

but in the end, I don't think that it can replace us as journalists.

Because journalism in the end is more than producing words, it means being there when things happen,

asking questions, checking facts and taking responsibility for what we publish.

And AI platforms in the end also depend on reliable, verified information.

People can trust their answers only when they are based on carefully checked facts,

and in the end, this is our job to provide this information.

And that is why journalism, in my opinion, matters to democracy.

People need facts and context to form their own opinions,

and our job is not to tell them what to think, but to help them think for themselves.

I'm grateful to the Commission, for the European Commission for making this prize possible and for supporting independent journalism.

At the same time, I would like to remind you that the Commission is a powerful institution with interests of its own, and like any institution,

it may perhaps not welcome reporting that shows where things have gone wrong,

and perhaps it also may not welcome if we are asking whether senior officials have acted properly.

So that is why here in Brussels too, I think we must remind ourselves every day that our duty is to report fairly. And accurately whoever is involved.

So dear finalists, my advice to you is simple stay curious, listen carefully, check your facts,

stay close to those who rely on your reporting and try to keep enough distance from those you cover.

And when it comes to speed, work fast, but never let speed become for accuracy.

At TPA we say be first, but first be right.

Now I think I've talked long enough, the spotlight belongs to you, the finalists,

keep doing this demanding and wonderful job that we have, Europe needs your questions, your courage, your stories.

Yeah, this is my, my, my wish for you, and I think now the moment we have been waiting for.

There's another envelope here in the 2nd round. I'll have a see.

You're really doing the suspense with the He's taking his time.

So in the 2nd round, the prize goes to Zan Ubania. Come back. Congratulations. Thank you, congratulations, Jean, well deserved. Thank you for all of your contributions.

Later we will hear from you also, but now we have to go to the 3rd round of finalists. Thank you very much. You get that.

We will also take family photos with the prices later.

So now please help me in welcoming to the stage the 3rd final round of our finalists,

Tizana Albanese, Paul Lucemont, and Marcus Hartmann.

Also, I am missing someone to sit next to me and to be our prize giver.

The 3rd person to do that is better known for his work at Politico, notably the Brussels Playbook newsletter,

but only 3 years ago he was also one of the finalists of the Megalizi Nazelski Award. Please welcome Max Griera. Welcome.

I guess you know the drill by now. Please introduce yourselves. OK. Greetings everyone. I'm Tizian Albanese. I'm 27 years old and I'm Italian.

I live in Palermo in Sicily and I work as a journalist for the Journaledi Sicilia,

one of the most important newspapers in my region, and as a press officer for an Italian workers association. I Hi everyone. My name is Paul. I'm from France.

I'm 24 years old and I'm a freelance journalist at several radio and TV channels like France Television. Hello everyone. I'm Marie.

I'm 22 years old and I'm from Germany.

I study communications and literature in Munich at LMU and I'm currently doing an internship in the fashion department of a German,

daily newspaper in Berlin.

I also manage several social media accounts and I'm doing video editing as well. Amazing. Thank you all so much.

Mr Tiziano, you currently work for the Journaledi Sicilia and you are very engaged with the right to stay for Sicilians,

and you are also the president and co-founder of the organization Nunci Parti.

So which role does local journalism play in ensuring the right to stay, in your opinion?

Thanks to my work at the Journaredi Sicilia, I often interview young people who have chosen to stay in Sicily.

Through their stories, we can shed light on the challenges and the opportunities faced by those who decide to build their future there.

In Sicily, young people say, we want the right to choose whether to leave or to stay.

Local journalists can give a voice to those who stand up for this right and turn their individual stories into an issue that politics and society need to address.

You are also very engaged in plenty of youth activities, such as youth Council, and you are also coordinating Erasmus Plus projects in your region,

so do you maybe have a message regarding your profession's responsibility towards youth?

Thank you, when we talk about young people,

I think journalism has an important responsibility to listen to them before telling their stories.

Young people are not only the future, they are already part of the present with their ideas, proposals and new ways of seeing society.

That is why a journalist should also find new tools and new ways to let them express themselves without speaking for them or using stereotypes.

Because giving space to new generations also means bringing new points of view, new questions into public debate,

and I think this is very, very important if we believe in Europe and its regions in step with the times. We continue with you, Paul.

Paul already has quite some work experiences under his belt.

You've been working for both written media, TV, radio outlets.

So which journalistic medium maybe represents you the most?

I would say radio represents me the most because first of all,

I really enjoy being Behind the microphone in a studio and talking to the auditors and as well I think because it embodies the most my vision of journalism because in radio you can really actually have kind of a proximity with the audience and the auditors and and I think it's really useful to actually tell a story in a deeper perspective to the audience.

As you said, you did a podcast trilogy with a team of extreme expeditions.

If we would maybe think of journalism as an extreme expedition into the unknown every day as we keep showing up in the field,

maybe what was the most unexpected thing that you discovered on your journey so far as a journalist?

I think it's the fact that journalists nowadays are really constantly.

To multitask themselves with different kinds of skills nowadays a written reporter is also a video one,

or for example, like a TV reporter is also a cameraman sometimes.

So it's really important to actually have a lot of skill in your bag to actually be more useful in more ways when you are on the ground. That is very true. We continue with Marie. You work.

You work across very different formats from traditional magazines all the way to TikTok.

So what has each of these experiences taught you about storytelling?

So I feel like the media landscape is just changing really, really fast.

So you always need to know your platforms and how they work,

and at the same time, you can't let the algorithm or numbers lead you.

So I feel like the key to good journalistic storytelling is to At the same time,

we get a good balance of grabbing the attention of the viewers or the readers,

but at the same time keeping your journalistic standards and quality in mind.

One of your first digital newsroom experiences was working for online meteorological platform. Very interesting.

So maybe what would you say is your biggest storm, biggest challenge as a journalist so far, and what did you learn from it?

Well, yeah, I've experienced some storms at that job,

especially in the comment section, cause I did, mostly social media.

And if you wouldn't think it or you wouldn't expect it,

but even simple things as the weather forecast make people really, really emotional.

So the thing I've learned is to, take feedback seriously but also not personally.

And I feel like I try to bring that into my work.

In Being curious and listening to a lot of perspectives, but at the same time,

Being aware of my expertise and trusting my judgment. Thank you very much.

It is very true, for some reason at our news portal, some of the most read pieces are always about the weather,

and I was wondering who is reading that, but actually that's the most popular thing, I guess.

So now we have just heard from 3 more finalists, and we have seen their work,

and now there is only one last question to ask, and Max is going to answer it. This one is.

I'll be quick cause I guess everyone wants to know who's, who's winning, of course.

I'll just say that, yeah, 3 years ago I was getting this prize, and,

and now 3 years later, I'm 24, still a young journalist starting my career in a way. So I'm one of you.

We have a lot of challenges ahead as young journalists, you know, this cohort, the three of you represent them very well.

We have the elections in France, Paul, you'll be covering, super exciting.

But, you know, like France, like many other elections that we'll see next year, like we saw in Hungary, and Romania,

more and more information with social media, it's more difficult to discern what's true, what's not, so that's obviously gonna be our job.

That's also with you Mary, Tiziana on social media, key in the future, we all need to be on social media asAP, you know. I'm, I'm now in the Parliament.

I covered the Parliament and political and political parties and more and more MEPs, the political groups are on social media, right, and exploring new ways, that's across the spectrum, and I feel like journalists still need to catch up with Politico,

we need to catch up, the DPR needs to catch up, we all need to catch up,

and we are young people that we know how, you know, social media works, we should at least, we, we need to be there.

So yeah, I mean, We have tough times ahead because of social media, because of the polarization,

political polarization, but we need to be there to, to help with it, right?

To do our job and to hold power to account in line with what the DPA chief here said, the Commission, local authorities in Berlin,

even in your fashion magazine, we need to hold power to account,

question those who are in power who make decisions, cause that's our main job.

Well, we have, we have seats, front row seats for history, right?

That's a very common thing that is set also by our former editor in chief, John Harris in Washington.

So that's something I keep always in mind.

When doing my job, but also that comes with the responsibility of have the privilege of being there,

then we need to make the tough questions and that will come with angry phone calls, you know, many, many.

If you haven't received one yet, you'll be lucky enough perhaps soon or angry comments,

and we need to withstand that and just go through it and keep pushing because times ahead are, are tough as journalists. Without further ado, So, The winner is. And in turn, Marcus Hartmann. Thanks a lot to the last finalist. And to you, Max, of course.

Marie, before you sit, I would like to welcome all three winners back on the stage. You can come with your statues. It's your time to shine again. Where is the 3rd 1? Jean, where is Jean? He's chit chatting. Take your time.

You're the winner, you can do whatever you want now.

Firstly, a big congratulations to all three of you.

We are going to have the family photos again after, but now,

please could you shortly tell us your message to the audience?

Here you have an EU-wide audience from policymakers, journalists, people from all different countries.

So what would be your message today for all?

My message, I don't think I should be the one that sends the message, but I guess, I think the democracy. Something we all have to work for.

I think Democracy is Europe and Europe is democracy.

I think it's worth fighting for it with facts, Everything we have,

because in the end it's worth it, absolutely.

Thank you, I think it's incredible how, on Saturday, I didn't know any of you, and today I feel like we have created our little family,

and even though we all come from different countries and from different contexts and we do different forms of journalism,

there is something that unites us all, and that's passion for our profession.

As journalists, we had a debate on Saturday during one of the seminars,

whether our mission as journalists was to be watchdogs or if it was to be contributors of change.

Those of you who were at the seminar remember, I think that the truth might be somewhere in the middle, but at the end of the day,

we're all storytellers, and as storytellers, our voices should stay authentic, our words sharp and our eyes should always be on the people.

Well, I can just add to that, you did really well. My message is pretty straightforward.

Stay curious, stay passionate, do what you love and let people know, inform them.

You never know who you're going to reach, especially now in times when we have loads of resources.

We can just go on the internet and tell people our mission, so keep doing that.

You never know who you're going to reach.

In the end,

I would also like to say a short message to all those participants who were not the finalists or who didn't win the prize.

From my personal experience from 2019, a lot of people who were not among the prize winners created.

Amazing, beautiful careers that I'm proud to look through the social media,

and we really stayed in contact and this project made us great friends.

So it is important that you came here, that you motivated yourself and that you've been networking,

and it's going to bring you far in your future, I'm sure.

And with that, we come to the end of today's ceremony, but before we leave, one special thanks to our host,

Director General Themis Christophidou, to Max Griera,

who has been giving the award, as well as Arnegård Hansen.

Thank you,

and a special thanks also once again to the families of Antonio Fumagalli and Bartnik Nawski.

It has been a pleasure to see you here again 7 years later. Thank you very much. B.

We will do family photos, and let's continue carrying forward the spirit of António and Bartnik.

Thank you all for joining us.