ON Eliot Higgins (Class of 1997) was recently awarded the Treaties of Nijmegen medal in recognition for his work with his independent news organisation, Bellingcat.

The Treaties of Nijmegen Medal is awarded every other year to “a person or an organisation that has made a special contribution in politics, science, economics or culture to the development and position of Europe, or has made a contribution to European peace, tolerance and/or mutual respect between European citizens”. (Source: intonijmegen.com)

The award was founded to commemorate the original peace conference in 1678 that ended the Dutch war between France, Spain and the Dutch republic. It was was first given in 2010 to Jacques Delors, the former Chairman of the European Commission who was instrumental in the creation of the Maastricht Treaty. Other recipients have included author Umberto Eco and the European Court of Human Rights.

Eliot established Bellingcat in 2014 in order to investigate world events in an independent and verifiable way. The organisation uses open-source intelligence such as satellite imagery and photos and videos in the public domain. The recent award follows a succession of prizes and nominations, such as Emmy Awards in 2021 with CNN for "Outstanding Investigative Report in a Newscast" and "Outstanding Research: News regarding the investigation into the Poisoning of Russian Opposition Leader Alexey Navalny" and the Society of Editors’ Media Freedom Awards "International News Media Organisation of the Year".