Five independent jury members selected projects for funding under IJ4EU’s flagship grant scheme in 2024/25.
The International Press Institute, which leads the consortium of organisations running the IJ4EU fund, has unveiled the identities of the five independent jury members who presided over the 2024/25 edition of the programme’s flagship grant scheme for cross-border journalism.
The jury met three times during their tenure to select projects for funding under the Investigation Support Scheme, which provides grants of up to €50,000 for journalistic collaborations across Europe.
Altogether, they allocated €1.5 million in grants to 44 cross-border teams. See the results of their deliberations following three open calls for proposals — in April 2024, November 2024 and April 2025.
Editorial independence is a central pillar of the IJ4EU fund. No donor is permitted to influence the selection of grantees or their work. That is why independent juries award all IJ4EU grants and prizes.
Aside from jury chairs, the identities of jury members are kept secret until all projects or awards have been chosen for a given grant or award cycle.
Here are the journalists who served as jury members for the Investigation Support Scheme during the 2024/25 edition of the IJ4EU programme.
Carlos Dada (Chair), co-founder of El Faro (El Salvador)
Carlos Dada is an award-winning Salvadoran journalist and co-founder of El Faro, Central America’s groundbreaking digital investigative news outlet. A pioneer in independent journalism, Dada has spent over two decades exposing corruption, violence, and abuse of power in one of the most dangerous regions in the world for reporters.
Founded in 1998 in post-civil war El Salvador, El Faro has become a model of high-impact investigative reporting. Under Dada’s leadership, the newsroom has revealed major corruption scandals involving former presidents, documented systemic human rights violations and pursued long-form investigations that often span years. Dada and his team have persisted despite constant threats, smear campaigns and surveillance — including being targeted with Pegasus spyware while investigating government links to organised crime.
Known for his integrity and fearlessness, Dada has reported widely on war crimes, migration, drug trafficking and environmental destruction. His work has earned him numerous accolades, including the IPI-IMS World Press Freedom Hero Award, the Maria Moors Cabot Award and the ICFJ Trailblazer Award.
Ioana Avadani, president of the board, Center for Independent Journalism (Romania)
Ioana Avadani heads the Center for Independent Journalism (CIJ) in Bucharest. In 2013, she was awarded the European Citizen of the Year prize by the European Parliament.
She has over 25 years of experience in the media, having worked as a news agency deputy editor-in-chief, a TV editor and as a media developer with CIJ.
As CIJ director (1998-2019), Avadani coordinated programmes ranging from professional training for journalists to targeted assistance for media operations, from advocacy for transparency, press freedom and protection of journalists to curricula development and strengthening of journalists’ associations in Romania. She was instrumental in the passing of critical legislation such as access-to-information and sunshine laws, the broadcast law and public broadcasting services and public procurement legislation. She has also been central to media self-regulation in Romania. In 2018, she was elected president of the CIJ board.
Between 2004 and 2006, Avadani served two stints as president of the South East European Network for the Professionalization of the Media, a network of 18 training centres and media institutes in 10 countries in Southeastern Europe. Between 2015 and 2019, she served as a member of the Council of IFEX, one of the largest global networks of organisations specialising in freedom of expression.
Avadani has published numerous articles and studies dedicated to media development in Romania and the SEE region. She was a Visiting Research Fellow with the Media and Democracy in Central and Eastern Europe Programme at St Antony’s College at Oxford University. She has appeared as a speaker at many national and international events and taught numerous courses for various audiences. She has an MA in Anthropology and an MA in Applied Ethics. She is completing a PhD in Anthropology.
Pilar Requena, chair of the steering committee of the EBU Investigative Journalism Network (Spain)
Pilar Requena is a distinguished Spanish investigative and international journalist, with a career spanning nearly four decades. Known for her fearless reporting, sharp geopolitical analysis and dedication to public interest journalism, she is the Director of Documentos TV, the prestigious documentary program on RTVE, Spain’s public broadcasting corporation.
Since 2021, Requena has also chaired the Steering Committee of the European Broadcasting Union’s Investigative Journalism Network, where she plays a leading role in shaping cross-border collaborations that strengthen journalistic integrity across Europe. She has represented RTVE in this network since 2018, bringing her deep experience in global affairs and investigative storytelling to the European stage.
Her international reporting career began in 1987 and has included major roles such as correspondent in Berlin for Germany and Central and Eastern Europe (1999–2004), and a long tenure as a senior reporter for En Portada, RTVE’s flagship international affairs program (2004–2020). Her work has taken her from the corridors of European power to conflict zones in Afghanistan, Pakistan, Syria, Liberia and beyond.
A respected academic and analyst, Requena has also lectured in journalism and international relations at universities in Madrid and contributed extensively to the Spanish Institute for Strategic Studies (IEEE), publishing analytical pieces on terrorism, transitional justice, peace processes, and global security. Her commitment to thoughtful, ethical journalism is matched by her academic contributions to understanding complex international issues.
She is the author of several books, including El Populismo Pardo (2025), a study of the far right in Germany; Angela Merkel, la canciller eterna (2021); La potencia reticente (2017), on post-Cold War Germany; and Afganistán (2011), a deeply reported account of the country’s long conflict. She is also co-author of Queremos Saber (2012), which examines the crisis of journalism from the perspective of foreign correspondents.
Requena’s journalism has been widely recognised. She is a recipient of the 2022 Ones Award for her lifelong commitment to human rights, the prestigious King of Spain International Journalism Award, the European Civis Award and the Salvador de Madariaga Award.
Michael Montgomery, senior reporter, Center for Investigative Reporting (United States)
Michael Montgomery is a senior reporter and broadcast producer for the California-based Center for Investigative Reporting and its podcast, Reveal.
Montgomery leads major collaborations and reports on America’s penal system, human rights and international trade and labour exploitation. Previously, he was a senior reporter for American Public Media, an associate producer for CBS News, and a Balkans correspondent for the Daily Telegraph, where he covered the wars in Croatia and Bosnia and the siege of Sarajevo.
Montgomery’s investigations into human rights violations in Kosovo led to the prosecutions and convictions of Serbian and Albanian paramilitaries and sparked the creation of a special war crimes tribunal in The Hague. More recently, he co-produced an investigation into forced labour in the Dominican sugar industry that led to a U.S. import ban.
Montgomery is the recipient of numerous honours, among them Murrow, Peabody, IRE, duPont and Overseas Press Club awards. He is a longtime member of the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists and serves on the board of the World Press Institute.
Paola Totaro, award-winning freelance journalist and author (United Kingdom)
Paola Totaro is an award-winning Italian-Australian journalist and editor and a former President of the Foreign Press Association in London.
A former Europe correspondent for The Sydney Morning Herald and The Age (Melbourne), she is based in London and writes on social policy, politics and culture for Australian and British publications, including The New European.
She is the author of On the Scent: Unlocking the Mysteries of Smell – And How its Loss Can Change Your World (Elliott and Thompson, 2023). Totaro was awarded her PhD in the Department of English, Goldsmiths, University of London, the same year.