Open Estonia Foundation's 2008 Concord award laureates are Ahto Lobjakas and Ivan Makarov

The Open Estonia Foundation's annual Concord award goes to Radio Free Europe journalist Ahto Lobjakas and Radio 4 journalist Ivan Makarov this year. The 2008 award reveres intercultural dialogue and integrating Estonia into wider Europe and the entire world.

"To be in dialogue, one needs to be well informed,” Mall Hellam, Executive Director of OEF, said.”Lobjakas and Makarov have intermediated EU and Russian-speaking population’s messages in bona fide manner and with great detail," she added.

At the event, a scholarship will be given to a Georgian student Nino Ghvinadze from Thbilisi University for her studies at Eurocollege transition program, University of Tartu.

Open Estonia Foundation established the Concord prize in 1997 to honor those whose impact to the development of open society in Estonia has been remarkable. Recipients are announced every year in April. In 2007, the Concorde award was given to Chancellor of Justice Allar Jõks and posthumously to Ülle Aaskivi, Estonian lawyer and politician.