Bektour Iskender is a journalist, educator, and co-founder of Kloop Media, one of Kyrgyzstan’s largest media outlets that doubles as a journalism school to equip youth in the country with the skills to investigate and report on corruption. Despite death threats from the national security services, Iskender and his team of teenage reporters continue to investigate government corruption. Speaking truth to power, they live-blogged the 2010 Kyrgyz Revolution, which culminated in the ousting of Kyrgyzstan’s corrupt administration. Iskender is currently using machine learning to uncover corruption and is working to launch Kyrgyzstan’s first satellite into space with a team of all-female engineers.
