Cameraman Miguel Ángel de la Fuente wins the Cirilo Rodríguez Journalism Award

Miguel Ángel de la Fuente, TVE cameraman, in an image provided by the author.

Miguel Ángel de la Fuente, one of the oldest photojournalists on the Spanish scene, has been the winner of the XXXVIII edition of the journalism award in memory of Cirilo Rodríguez, convened by the Association of Journalists of Segovia. De la Fuente has been a cameraman for Spanish Television for three decades and now a special envoy to Ukraine.

In his professional career, this journalist, who receives 8,000 euros as a prize and a sculpture from the Real Fabrica de Cristales de La Granja, called Lente de la tierra, has traveled the world recording sounds and images about different conflicts and humanitarian crises. In the Persian Gulf, the Balkans, the Middle East, Africa, Brazil, Cuba, the Philippines, Thailand, Nicaragua, Afghanistan, Haiti and this last year in the war in Ukraine after the Russian invasion. A land that he already knew because he also stepped on it in 2014, after the annexation of Crimea.

De la Fuente represents the essence of photojournalism, according to the jury, made up of representatives of national media and sponsored by the Segovia City Council, the Provincial Council and CaixaBank. The finalists were the editor of TVE Óscar Mijallo and the collaborator of the magazine Atalayar and other media María Senovilla, both sent to Ukraine. They receive 2,000 euros and a smaller-scale sculpture.

Mijallo is specialized in international information. He has been a correspondent for Televisión Española in Jerusalem for nine years, and has been a witness to the conflicts that have devastated the planet in the last 20 years. He has worked in the Middle East and also knows first-hand Sudan, Mali, Western Sahara, Venezuela, Bolivia, Chile, Ecuador… Three books have been born from his experience: The girl at the gates of hell, The doctor from Mosul and The kiss from the oceans.

Senovilla, for his part, represents the other side of international information, especially in conflict zones. She is a freelance, no one covers her back, and she fights every day to place his information in a good number of media. She is the Spanish journalist and photographer who has been covering the Russian invasion of Ukraine for the longest time. She arrived in Odessa six days after the start of the war and in these almost 15 months she has traveled practically all the conflict zones in eastern and southern Ukraine. Specialized in defense and communication of armed conflicts, she is a professional who has prepared to go to war and tell about it. Before Ukraine, she was in Afghanistan and in various conflicts in Africa. In addition, the journalist and collaborator of EL PAÍS Aurelio Martín, considered the “soul” of each call for 30 years, has received the honorary Cirilo Rodríguez, already held by Enrique Meneses, Carmen Sarmiento and Dolores Masana.