I'm incredibly honored to win the Polk Award for magazine reporting for my article in Rolling Stone, "The A-Team" killings. Here's the press release:
Matthieu Aikins, a freelance journalist who has reported from Afghanistan for five years, will receive the George Polk Award for Magazine Reporting for “The A-Team Killings” published in the November 21 issue of Rolling Stone. In the course of five months of dogged reporting from one of the country’s most dangerous areas, Aikins developed convincing evidence that a 12-man U.S. Army Special Forces unit and their Afghan translators rounded up and executed 10 civilians in the Nerkh district of Wardak province, where allegations of extrajudicial killings had emerged in early 2013. The army, which initially denied the charges, opened a criminal inquiry, and human rights organizations called for thorough and impartial investigations.
The article was the product of a team effort and wouldn't have been possible without the support of the editors and staff at Rolling Stone, my friend and driver Ruhollah Ahmadi who took us through an ambush, and, most of all, my dedicated colleague Fazal Rahman Muzhary. And congratulations to the Polk winners in other categories, which include Glenn Greenwald, Laura Poitras, Ewen MacAskill and Barton Gellman for their reporting on Edward Snowden's revelations.
According to the US Army's Criminal Investigation Command, the investigation into the allegations of war crimes remains ongoing.