Foundation for Defense of Democracies

Since FDD launched the Investigative Reporting Project in 2003, FDD Journalist-in-Residence Claudia Rosett has generated international headlines with award winning reporting.

She revealed the Oil-for-Food scandal and a plethora of other scandals that have led to convictions of UN officials for bribery, graft, and money laundering schemes.

In 2005, Claudia received the Eric Breindel Award for Excellence in Opinion Journalism. The Breindel Award was established to recognize: "the columnist, editorialist or reporter whose work best reflects the spirit of writings by Eric Breindel: Love of country and its democratic institutions as well as the act of bearing witness to the evils of totalitarianism." Her work has been widely praised: Click here for what they are saying about Claudia Rosett.

She continues to break stories related to corruption and malfeasance at the United Nations and has also focused on the Iranian regime’s efforts to use international institutions and a network of allies to shield itself from international sanctions against its nuclear program.

For example, in February 2010, she broke the story that Iran was seeking a seat on the UN Human Rights Council. Two months later, Iran quietly dropped its bid. She noted in subsequent reports that Iran did succeed in gaining a seat on the UN Commission of the Status of Women, and has also reported and written repeatedly on Iran’s presence on the governing boards of such major UN agencies as UNICEF, the UN Development Program and the World Food Program.

She is currently pursuing stories on Iran's efforts to evade sanctions, both in international markets and by wielding backroom influence at the UN.  She also continues to expose many of the world’s most oppressive regimes and human rights violators.

In January of 2011, Rosett testified before the House Committee on Foreign Affairs on "The UN: Urgent Problems that Need Congressional Action." Drawing on numerous investigations, including her own extensive reporting on the UN, she focused on systemic ways in which the UN's immunities and poor internal oversight lend themselves not only to corruption and waste, but to activities that endanger the security interests of America and America's allies -- such as the UN's importation, in the name of aid, of dual-use items and technology into North Korea.

“The very best investigative reporting is being done not by big names at the big papers, but by people like the Foundation for Defense of Democracies' Journalist-in-Residence, Claudia Rosett.”
—Hugh Hewitt, The Weekly Standard