Time magazine’s editors have selected "The Guardians and the War on Truth" for the cover of their 2018 Person of the Year edition, recognizing a group of journalists they say are symbolic of a broader fight around the world to hold those in power to account.

The four journalists include murdered Washington Post columnist Jamal Khashoggi; Maria Ressa, an editor of a Philippine news website critical of President Rodrigo Duterte; Wa Lone and Kyaw Soe Oo, two Reuters journalists imprisoned in Myanmar for investigating the massacre of Rohingya Muslims; and the staff at the Capital Gazette newspaper in Annapolis, Md. where four journalists and a sales assistant were killed by a gunman in June.

In an essay about the choice, the magazine’s editor-in-chief Edward Felsenthal wrote that all of the journalists included in the selection had “paid a terrible price to seize the challenge of this moment.” He also said their struggle is symbolic.

“They are representative of a broader fight by countless others around the world — as of Dec. 10, at least 52 journalists have been murdered in 2018 — who risk all to tell the story of our time,” Felsenthal wrote.

The inclusion of Khashoggi, who was killed at the Saudi Arabian consulate in Istanbul, Turkey in early October, marks the first time the magazine has named someone who is deceased as its Person of the Year.

U.S. President Donald Trump was runner-up, while U.S. Special Counsel Robert Mueller was third pick.

The choice was announced on a U.S. TV morning show Tuesday, revealing four different magazine cover designs featuring the four journalists and the Capital Gazette newspaper staff. In the cover dedicated to Wa Lone and Kyaw Soe, the jailed journalists’ wives are shown holding up photos of their husbands.

In 2017, Time magazine's editors selected "The Silence Breakers," to recognize the individuals whose testimonials about sexual hasrassment and assault sparked an international movement.

The year before, the just-elected U.S. President Donald Trump was Time magazine's Person of the Year. He also made the shortlist in 2017 and 2018.