Photo from Yemen is best press photo 2011
A photograph taken in Yemen has been named the best press photo of last year. The photo, which won the 2011 World Press Photo Award, shows a woman in a black full-face veil holding an injured relative in her arms.
The photo was taken by Samuel Aranda from Spain. He took it last October in the Yemeni capital Sanaa in a mosque where opponents of President Ali Abdallah Saleh had set up a field hospital.
"The photo stands for the entire region," said jury member Koyo Kouoh in Amsterdam, explaining the award in the world's most important photo competition. "It presents Yemen, Egypt, Tunisia, Libya, Syria - simply everything that happened during the Arab Spring." The special thing about the photo is that it shows "a private, intimate side" of a significant development. Aranda was in Yemen on assignment for the New York Times.
Selected from 100,000 photos
The three AFP photographers Yasuyoshi Chiba, Massoud Hossaini and Pedro Pardo were also honored in the competition, which was held in several categories. Chiba was awarded first prize in the "People in the News" category for his photos of the aftermath of the earthquake and tsunami in Japan.
Due to its historical significance, the photo taken by an amateur photographer of the former Libyan ruler Muammar
al-Gaddafi on October 20, 2011 in Sirte shortly before his death.
A total of 57 photographers from 24 countries were honored in 18 categories. The jury selected from more than 100,000 submitted photos. (SDA/AFP).
