Scott Pelley Steps In Last Minute For Lara Logan At Journalism Awards Ceremony

By Jordan Chariton 

Scott Pelley stepped in as host last night for Lara Logan at the International Press Freedom Awards in Manhattan.

Logan was supposed to host for the event put on by the Committee to Protect Journalists, but dropped out over the controversy of her discredited “60 Minutes” report. Earlier in the day CBS Chairman Jeff Fager announced Logan and her producer Max McClellan were put on a leave of absence following the release of an internal report that found the Benghazi report “deficient in several respects.”

Pelley did not speak about the “60 Minutes” controversy at the awards ceremony, but TIME Inc. Chief Content Officer Norman Pearlstine did, defending Logan, and suggesting more of the blame should be shouldered by Logan’s editor.

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“I tend to think that more often than not it is really the editor, sitting behind the desk directing the reporter, who is more at fault and more to blame than the reporter,” Pearlstine said. “It is often a very difficult task when a story gets an extraordinary head of steam to stop it, and yet that, quite often, is really the way that editors do protect journalists. “

Ecuadorean television reporter Janet Hinostroza, Egyptian television host and satirist Bassem Youssef, Turkey’s investigative journalist Nedim Sener, and Vietnam blogger Nguyen Van Hai all received awards.

 

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