The Unknown Perspectve: Women Photojournalists on the Frontline
For female photojournalists the past six weeks have been a particularly brutal reminder of the dangers they face. Two photographers have recently been killed while making a record of the suffering on humanity’s most extreme edges, documenting the otherwise hidden effects of war on people left to endure tremendous hardship and pain.
German photographer Anja Niedringhaus was shot dead at a checkpoint in Afghanistan on 4 April by a man in police uniform, and just four weeks later, a young French photographer, Camille Lepage, died of gunshot wounds in the Central African Republic. The French government has said Lepage was deliberately targeted and murdered, although it remains unclear if this was at the hands of the Christian militias with whom she was travelling or whether, in fact, her death was an accident and she was caught in crossfire.
“This is a profession of the brave and the passionate, those committed to the mission of bringing to the world information that is fair, accurate and important,” said Gary Pruitt, president of the Associated Press, after Niedringhaus’s death. “Anja Niedringhaus met that definition in every way.”
More: Women on the Frontline: Female Photojournalists’ Visions of Conflict