Channel A wins major prize at the Asian TV Awards

Channel A documentary “Special Report: The Defectors from North Korea,” has won the second place prize in the 19th Asian TV Awards Best Documentary.

The defection documentary was the first general cable TV station in Korea to win at the Asian TV Awards held at the Singapore Marina Bay Sands Hotel on December 11. The first prize went to “Freedom Project,” which was an exposé of human rights violations by the CNN Hong Kong office.

The director, PD Yang Seung-won of Channel A, said in his remarks that he was proud of having informed the international community of the necessity of protecting human rights in North Korea.

This is the second award garnered by the documentary overseas, having already won the top documentary prize at the U.S. World Fest Houston International Film Festival in April, becoming the first general cable channel to do so. The Houston festival is cited as one of the top three international media awards in North America.

This show has followed and covered the process of 15 North Korean residents crossing the Amnok River to defect. Among the defectors was the 7-year-old Kim Shin-hyeok, and the documentary also followed Kim in his adapting to South Korean life.

When it was first broadcast in January 2013 it had top viewership ratings among all cable TV shows excluding TV dramas. In March 2013, Japan’s Nippon TV broadcast it, posting 11.8 percent viewership ratings.

The Korea Communication Standards Commission in January 2013 awarded the defector documentary with “Good Show of the Month.” The documentary in July 2014 won the new media segment of 2014 award presented by the Commission.