May Chidiac
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
May Chidiac is a Christian Lebanese journalist.
Ms. Chidiac works for the Lebanese Broadcasting Corporation, where she is a television anchor. She was usually critical of Syria, which until April 2005 had stationed troops in Lebanon. On the day she was nearly killed, she had hosted a talk show in which she voiced fears over further violence ahead of the UN report on the death of Rafiq Hariri.
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[edit] Terrorist attack
Chidiac was seriously injured on September 25, 2005, by a car bomb in Jounieh, Lebanon. The bomb which nearly killed her was a one-pound device, detonated as she entered her car. Her left leg below the knee was blown off and her hair and clothes were set on fire. She was said to be in stable condition following the amputation of her severely injured left arm. The blast was one of a series of bombings in Lebanon targeting critics of Syria, in which one other prominent journalist, Samir Kassir, and anti-Syrian politicians including George Hawi and Gebran Tueni, editor and publisher of the daily newspaper, An-Nahar, have been murdered.
On the 25th of November, May appeared on TV, defiant, smiling and promising a return to her job.
She travelled to France to continue her treatments.
On the 27th of January, 2006 May announced her candidacy for the vacated Maronite seat in Lebanon's Baabda-Aley by-election in a televised interview.
On 12 July 2006, May Chidiac returned to Beirut. Straight from the airport, Chidiac wanted her first stop on Lebanese soil to be at the monastery of the Lebanese Maronite St. Charbel, in Jbeil (the location where she spent the day before the attack on her life) and took part in a thanksgiving mass celebrated by the superior of the monastery, Fr Tannous Nehme.
[edit] Awards
On October 27, 2006 May Chidiac received one of the three Courage in Journalism Awards presented by the International Women's Media Foundation. The award ceremony was held at the waldorf-Astoria in New York. An American reporter kidnapped in Iraq and a Chinese journalist twice jailed for her economic and political reporting also received this award.
On 3 May 2006, UNESCO awarded the UNESCO/Guillermo Cano World Press Freedom Prize to May in recognition of her courage in defending and promoting freedom of the press.
