World Press Photo

A picture of dead children after an Israeli rocket attack in the Gaza Strip is press photo of the year 2012. The photograph by the Swede Paul Hansen shows a funeral procession in Gaza City last November. In the foreground of the picture, men hold two-year-old Suhaib Hijazi and her three-year-old brother Muhammad in their arms. Both children are dead. In the background, the father of the little ones, who was also killed, is being carried on a stretcher. The family's house had been destroyed in the rocket attack. The mourners were on their way to a mosque. Hansen shot the photo for the newspaper Dagens Nyheter. 

In total, the jury honored 54 photographers in nine categories. One Swiss photographer also received an award: Dominic Nahr took third place in the "General News Singles" category. His photo shows the mutilated body of a soldier smeared with petroleum on the border between Sudan and South Sudan. The 29-year-old Magnum photographer had shot the picture for Time magazine. Dominic Nahr has been living in Africa since 2008. He gave up a safe life to shoot pictures against oblivion. An oil pipeline explodes. Soldiers from the north and the south engage in a cruel battle. A short time later Nahr stops at the same place and shoots the picture with which he wins the prize a year later. But he finds the term voyeur completely out of place: "Often I'm the only photographer who captures these events."

As is already tradition, the exhibition with the award-winning images will be presented again this year by the Keystone picture agency in the Papiersaal in Zurich's Sihlcity. More than 400 guests were able to attend the passionate opening speech by Arnold Hottinger as well as the honoring of the winning photographer Paul Hansen. The former NZZ Middle East correspondent Hottinger emphasized the importance of "stirring critical images" and appealed to humanity during times of war. Hottinger also called for rethinking prejudices: "People in the Middle East want to show themselves. Neither as strangers nor as victims. They want to be perceived as human beings."

Jann Jenatsch, CEO of Keystone, is also impressed by the award-winning photographers. "The World Press Photo 13 exhibition aims to provide a platform for conversation and discovery, and to show people the indispensable work of press photographers." (pan)