Ethnic tensions and a controversial mullah in India, bored German soldiers in Afghanistan, a stalled revolution in Syria, Gaddhafi’s fall in Libya, elections in Egypt and much in-between: This was my 2011. Above is a slideshow with some of my favorite stories and pictures from this year.
Posts Tagged ‘afghanistan’
2011 – My Year in Pictures
Friday, December 30th, 2011In Progress: Fortress Europe
Wednesday, December 21st, 2011
An underage Afghan boy sleeps in an abandoned car near Patras, Greece, Oct. 11, 2009.
While borders inside Europe have almost vanished, the European Union struggles to close its external borders. Thousands of refugees, mostly from Afghanistan and African countries, try to get into Europe every day. Many pay for it with their lives. In the coming months, I will travel along Europe’s external borders to document the situation of refugees there. My aim is to create a major body of work that highlights the refugee crisis along the European Union’s external borders in a cohesive and comprehensive way. This project is funded in part by the Stiftung Kulturwerk, a German foundation that supports cultural and journalistic projects.
Afghan boys gather used munition after a training shoot of Belgian forces near Kunduz, Afghanistan, April 5, 2011. Financial hardship and a lack of security are the root causes for emigration from Afghanistan. Some Afghan boys start their journey towards Europe at ages as young as twelve.
The Medevac Controversy
Sunday, January 30th, 2011
US Army soldiers including flight medics of Task Force Shadow Charlie Company 6-101 Dustoff evacuate an American soldier, Southern Afghanistan, Nov. 28, 2010. The soldier got hit by shrapnel from an improvised explosive device. He suffered wounds at his head, chest and arms.
Within a week the New York Times, Time Magazine and the Toronto Star published stories on US Army flight medics, normally referred to as Medevac, an abbreviation of medical evacuation. This caused a little controversy started by Michael Shaw on BagNewsNotes. He asked if this clustering was due to the military’s public relations strategy that wanted the public to see stories of heroic rescues rather than combat.
Around the same time there where at least seven photographers embedded with Medevac units. I was one of them. My friends at dvafoto.com asked me to give my take on that controversy. You can read it in the post “The Medevac Stories with Daniel Etter”.
Here is a list of essays on Medevac units that appeared in the last months:
- “Is child abuse a new Taliban gambit?” by Nicki Sobecki (photos and text)
- “Profiles of a Dustoff 57, medevac team in Afghanistan” by David Brown (text) and Linda Davidson (photos)
- “The Birds Of Hope: With A Black Hawk Medevac Unit In Afghanistan” by James Nachtwey (photos and text… next time a photo editor tells me that you can’t write and photograph at the same time, I tell them: “Have you heard of this dude … Nachtwey?”)
- “In Wider War in Afghanistan, Survival Rate of Wounded Rises” by Tyler Hicks (photos) and C.J. Chivers (text)
- “Frontline medevac teams are life-savers in Afghanistan” by Louie Palu (photos and text)
Post-embed Post
Thursday, December 2nd, 2010
US Army soldiers including flight medics of Task Force Shadow Charlie Company 6-101 Dustoff evacuate an American soldier, Southern Afghanistan, Nov. 28, 2010. The soldier got hit by shrapnel from an improvised explosive device. He suffered wounds at his head, chest and arms.
I’ve just returned from an embed with an US Army medical evacuation unit based near Kandahar. Less blurry photos will come soon.
