iEmmys get political.

The 33rd edition of the International Emmy Awards, a traditional end of November event, made history by becoming politically charged. The International Emmy Founders Award was presented by New York senator Hillary Rodham Clinton, who is not only campaigning for reelection this coming November, but is also a potential Presidential contender.

But if flashing camera bulbs and shouting reporters were any indication, Oprah Winffey--recipient of the Founders Award--was the other main attraction at this year's iEmmys, held at the Hilton New York hotel. Besides the talk show mogul, honorary awards were also bestowed upon U.K. company ITV, which won the international Emmy Directorate Award for outstanding contributions to the arts and sciences of international television; and Egyptian TV, which took home the International Children's Day of Broadcasting Award, which is co-presented annually by the International Academy and UNICEF.

And among the rest of the (suprisingly short) night's winners were ... French actor Thierry Fremont, who won the award for Best Performance by an Actor for his role in GMT Productions/TFI's Dam la tete du tueur (Murder in Mind); Chinese actress He Lin, who won the Best Actress award for her role in the China Movie Channel's Slave Mother: The Arts Programming award was bestowed upon BBC/CBC/ZDF/TVP co-production Holocaust--A Musical Memorial Film From Auschwitz. Another BBC series, Top Gear, won the Non-Scripted Entertainment award. The Children and Young People award was given to Shaftesbury Films' Canadian series Dark Oracle. Another Canadian show was honored, too: 100 percent Film & Television's The Newsroom picked up the Comedy award. German doc The Drama of Dresden, produced by Broadview TV and commissioned by ZDF-German Television, won the Documentary award. Denmark claimed two of the night's winners: The Eagle, A Crime Odyssey won the Drama Series award and Nordisk Film, Danish Broadcasting Company and SVT took home the TV Movie/Miniseries prize for Young Anderson.