Image of Melissa Bell
France24’s international correspondent, Melissa Bell, will host the ninth annual AIBs in London on Wednesday 6 November. The awards celebrate the best in international factual broadcasting and attracted entries from 34 countries as diverse as China, France, Germany, India, Kazakhstan, Mexico, Nigeria, Romania, South Africa and the United States.
Melissa Bell is an International Correspondent for France 24. After working for Granada Television and the BBC in the UK, she joined France24 in 2008. Since then she has reported extensively from Africa, the Arab world, the Americas and Asia, covering all the major news stories for France 24’s French and English channels.
Competition to win the awards is fierce with different categories pitting diverse entries against each other: for example, in “Current affairs documentary – radio” the shortlisted entries are from Radio Australia, Grey Heron Media, Radio Free Europe, Radio Taiwan International, Voice of Nigeria and Voice of Russia while the “Middle East documentary – TV” has Al Hurra, BBC News, Channel 4, CNN and NHK Wave battling to win.
Broadcasting and media executives, producers, editors and journalists from many countries will be attending the dinner from representing, among others, the CBC, ABC, CNN, DW, BBC, Kazakhstan TV and Radio, Voice of Russia, Channel 4, Antena 3, Bloomberg, Classic FM, Danmarks Radio, Kansai Telecasting, RFE/RL, VRT, France 24, RTG TV, RT, Facebook, TVE, TVC News, Sunset+Vine, Eutelsat and BAFTA.
The awards are sponsored by RTG TV and Ruptly. Ruptly will also be distributing the short list clip reel and providing the coverage of the awards ceremony.