Emmy Award winning journalist to receive special recognition from Zayed Prize

"As primary anchor of the CNN news show, Mr. Cooper traveled around the world with Sanjay Gupta, a chief medical correspondent, and Jeff Corwin, a wildlife biologist and Animal Planet host, for Planet in Peril," said Colonel Ahmed Rafia, Member of the Zayed Prize Committee.

"Together they investigated the current state of our planet, focusing on four major areas: global warming, overpopulation, deforestation and species loss," Colonel Rafia said.

Mr. Cooper reported from a wide variety of locations including Alaska, Brazil, Madagascar, Southeast Asia, and Yellowstone National Park, examining the effects of population growth, rising temperatures, and poaching, among others, on the global environment.

Cooper traveled to Brazil to examine connections between the rapid deforestation of the Amazon River Basin and changes in the world's climate, embedding with "poacher police" amid raids of illegal logging camps.

In Thailand and Cambodia, he walked the markets where endangered animals are bought and sold to find out how their removal can affect entire ecosystems.

Moreover, he traveled to Greenland to report on its melting ice sheet, where Cooper witnessed one of the world's newest islands, discovered when the ice receded.

Anderson Cooper 360° is broadcast from CNN's Time Warner Center studios in New York City, the program is simulcast on both CNN and CNN International (1st hour only except for breaking news or select special interest stories) at 10 p.m. ET, making the show available to people around the world.

The program covers a number of the stories of the day, usually through live or taped news reports from the network's correspondents.

The coverage can also include analysis from experts on the issues, commonly featured in, or after, the taped reports.

Cooper often anchors the program from the site of a major news story, such as his extensive coverage from New Orleans and the Gulf Coast in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina.

In 2006, Anderson Cooper 360°was nominated twice for a GLAAD Award in the category of "Outstanding TV Journalism - News Segment". The show has won the following awards:

2006 Emmy Award for Outstanding Live Coverage of a Breaking News Story Long Form for his report on the famine in Niger [1]; 2006 Emmy Award for Outstanding Feature Story in a Regularly Scheduled Newscast for his report on Charity Hospital [2]; 2006 Emmy Award for Outstanding Coverage of a Current Business News Story In a Regularly Scheduled Newscast for his report on Black Market Infertility.

Founded in 1999 by H. H. Sheikh Mohammad Bin Rashid Al Maktoum, Vice President and Prime Minister of the United Arab Emirates and Ruler of Dubai, the Zayed International Prize for the Environment recognizes and encourages environmental achievements supporting and promoting the implementation of Agenda 21, Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) and the Johannesburg Plan of Implementation for Sustainable Development, in line with the vision and philosophy of the late Sheikh Zayed Bin Sultan Al Nahyan, Father of the United Arab Emirates.