Korean boy band Big Bang won the “Worldwide Act” award at the 18th annual MTV Europe Music Awards (EMA) held in Belfast, Northern Ireland. This is the first time for a Korean artist to win a trophy at the EMAs.

For the newly created award which selects the winner based on online votes through the EMA official website, contestants representing each global region compete with nominees from other areas. The global finalists included Big Bang (Asia Pacific) Lena (Europe) Britney Spears (North America) Restart (Latin America) and Abdelfattah Grini (Africa and the Middle East.)

The members of the band expressed their hope that this presents an opportunity to introduce K-pop to an international audience.