2026 Awards winners

The Creative Documentary Competition Jury is composed of photographer and filmmaker Zed Nelson, writer and playwright Sarah Schulman, and filmmaker Dieudo Hamadi.

FIFDH Geneva Grand Award

A Fox Under a Pink Moon by Soraya Akhlaghi and Mehrdad Oskouei

A talented young Afghan artist driven by a powerful desire to transform her reality through art, Soraya Akhlaghi documents her courageous and deeply risky journey through a long-distance cinematic collaboration with Iranian filmmaker Mehrdad Oskouei. Their connection across technology and geography mirrors an experience shared by millions of migrants in a time of global upheaval. A Fox Under a Pink Moon is a deeply personal work: creative, harrowing and enlightening. 

10’000 CHF, Offered by the city and canton of Geneva
Awarded by the International Documentary Jury

FIFDH Gilda Vieira de Mello Award
In honour of her son Sergio Vieira De Mello

Letters from Wolf Street by Arjun Talwar

A unique work. Made on a small budget but with great care, Letters from Wolf Street is a nuanced, sophisticated and highly accessible film about grief and belonging. Far from his native India, Arjun Talwar confronts his own loneliness by building close relationships with neighbours in Warsaw. Through these encounters, he reveals everyday racism and the barriers to acceptance faced by migrants and long-standing Polish minorities alike. Both revealing and tender.

5’000 CHF, Offered by the Barbara Hendricks Foundation for Peace and Reconciliation
Awarded by the International Documentary Jury

Youth Jury Award – Documentary

A Fox Under a Pink Moon by Soraya Akhlaghi and Mehrdad Oskouei

The Youth Jury for Documentaries chose to award A Fox Under a Pink Moon, a particularly moving film. A strong sense of closeness emerged with Soraya, the protagonist, notably because of her age, but also through shared life experiences. This sense of closeness is reinforced by the film’s distinctive form, which alternates fragments of her daily life filmed on a phone with animated sequences inspired by her drawings and sculptures. Soraya does not film when she wants to, but when she can. This constraint gives the film its sincerity and lends particular weight to every image. Through these fragments emerges the turbulent journey of a resilient young woman who transforms her wounds into creation, and for whom art becomes a means of survival and renewal.

3’000 CHF, OFFERED BY PEACE BRIGADES INTERNATIONAL (PBI) AND THE HOSPICE GÉNÉRAL

Awarded by the Youth Jury – Documentary: Sekouba Camara, Andrea Carrer, Ali Jawadi, Amélie Lantéri, Elisa Levacher, Hesam Mohammadi and Dario Rizzo

The Fiction Jury is represented by writer Adania Shibli, director Elie Grappe, programmer Jenny Billeter, and Thierry Oppikofer, representative of the Barbour Foundation.

FIFDH Fiction Grand Award

Cotton Queen by Suzannah Mirghani

The film portrays its characters with delicacy and ambiguity, blending tenderness with moments of humour. Here humour becomes a way of confronting cruelty – and surviving it. At the same time, the story invites us to imagine paths other than those already laid out.  Reimagining the past becomes a way of reclaiming a place in history for those who have been erased.  

Additionally, the film reveals an understanding of feminism that is embedded in colonial experiences. Last but not least, it brings the question of human rights close to the question of nature, where the abuse of land and plants is not separate from the abuse of humans.

10’000 CHF, OFFERED BY THE HÉLÈNE AND VICTOR BARBOUR FOUNDATION
Awarded by the Fiction Jury

Special Mentions

Lost Land by Akio Fujimoto

For portraying play as a vital way of resisting pain and despair, and for showing how those who have lost everything are often the first to help others, remaining undefeated.

Between Dreams and Hope by Farnoosh Samadi

For its exploration of the strength of non-normative love as a force against social constraints.

Youth Jury Award– Fiction

Laundry by Zamo Mkhwanazi

The jury was deeply moved by this rich and complex film, which subtly portrays the repression of racialised communities under South Africa’s apartheid regime. The film’s remarkable use of music offers both escape from and contrast with the omnipresent violence endured by its protagonists. Through the actors’ performances, the narrative and thematic variations, and many other elements, all executed with great skill, this film unquestionably stood out.

3’000 CHF, OFFERED BY THE HOSPICE GÉNÉRAL

Awarded by the Youth Jury – Fiction: Laura Bapst Apst, Julien Chapiteau, Alice Kündig, Charles Massicote, Askadirou Nfankue, Dimitrios Sofologis and Mohammad Yousufi

The Focus Jury is composed of Judith Fiss (Amnesty International Switzerland), Elise Golay (International Service for Human Rights – ISHR), Spring Gombe (Policy/Strategy Group), Kibrom Mehari (HEKS/EPER) and Sharon Oseku-Frainier (Ramsar Convention on Wetlands).

Vision for Human Rights Award

Yurlu | Country by Yaara Bou Melhem

This film stands out for the quiet force of its perspective and its clear call for accountability. Yaara Bou Melhem’s hypnotic cinematography portrays Banjima Country with tenderness and dignity, while offering an uncompromising critique of colonial exploitation of land, labour, sovereignty and cultural heritage. Its consequences are still felt today in the deadly legacy of asbestos, which continues to claim lives. Yurlu | Country shows how environmental destruction and human rights abuses intersect through corporate impunity and government complicity. At a time of renewed global expansion in mining and resource extraction, its urgency is unmistakable.

5’000 CHF
Awarded by the Focus Jury

StoryBoard Impact Award

OLIMBI – Mother Courage by Karlo Mlinar

10’000 CHF awarded to a project from the Impact Days 2026 International Selection.

Another Story Foundation x Impact Social Club Award

​​This is Not A Civil War by Hnin Thet Hmu Khin and Oliver Petrie

2’500 EUR and a consulting session awarded to a project from the International Selection or Swiss Focus.

Swiss Focus Impact Award

​​To the Moon and Black by Elisa Gómez Alvarez

2’500 CHF awarded to a project presented in Swiss Focus.

Sublimages Impacts Award

Gaza Sunbirds by Flavia Cappellini

Translation and subtitling for a project from the International Selection or Swiss Focus.

The Working Films Impact Award

The Quiet Part by Rachel Lauren Mueller

Consulting workshop for a project from the International Selection.

IN HOSPITALS

Convergences Award

Life is Beautiful by Mohamed Jabaly

The jury was moved by the film’s luminous energy and its moments of genuine joy : an approach still rarely seen in stories about transition. Niñxs invites empathy and highlights the importance of recognising each person’s journey on their own terms.

FIFDH collaborates with the Maison de l’enfance et de l’adolescence (MEA) through a Convergences Jury workshop bringing together adolescents from different units.

IN CORRECTIONAL FACILITIES

Champ-Dollon Jury Award and Prix La Brenaz Jury Award

Before There Was Nothing by Yvann Yagchi

A Swiss filmmaker of Palestinian origin travels to the West Bank to make sense of the break-up with a childhood friend who became a Jewish settler. While trying to understand why their friendship has not held up in the face of the political situation, he reveals his own tragic family history in Palestine.