openDemocracy South America reporter Angelina de los Santos this week won Uruguay’s prestigious 'Marcelo Jelen' national press award for her year-long investigation into whether the country’s missing women are being trafficked while the state turns a blind eye.
Angelina “delved into nine cases of missing women, exposing omissions by police and the judiciary [...] to reveal that almost half of the thousands of annual reports of missing persons end up being confirmed as ‘absence’ cases – while suspicions of sex trafficking remain,” the judges wrote in the award certificate.
Her findings were picked up by at least 21 Uruguayan publications, with major Latin American media giants such as Infobae and El País amplifying it to vast Spanish-speaking audiences.
