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‘If we don’t go, how many will die?’

Fanny Carrier Wednesday 8 June 2016

"That night, I have trouble falling asleep. I look ahead of us, into the darkness, toward Libya," writes Fanny Carrier, AFP's deputy bureau chief in Rome.

"There, at this very moment, smugglers are in the process of getting the people who have paid them enormous amounts of money to the coast, to be loaded onto dinghies that often are hardly more solid than beach toys, then take off to the open sea in darkness."

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AFP / Angelos Tzortzinis

Working in the shadows, putting a spotlight on the world

Angelos Tzortzinis Wednesday 30 December 2015

This year’s winner of Time Magazine’s Best Wire Photographer award is Angelos Tzortzinis, a 31-year-old freelancer who has been contributing pictures to AFP as a stringer since 2007. The magazine chose Tzortzinis “for his heartfelt work” in documenting his country’s response to the unprecedented financial and migrant crises.

Reserved by nature, Tzortzinis picked up photography on a lark, but quickly became enthralled with it and has stuck with it in part because it offered a means of communicating with others. He is a bit uneasy with the spotlight since winning the award. 

“I prefer to remain in the shadows as I work,” he writes. “The prize has given me a boost of hope and energy to continue my work.

“It’s also great motivation for freelancers, who have to struggle every day… The fact that a freelancer won such a prestigious prize in Greece will give other stringers hope and encouragement to continue.”

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AFP / Philippe Huguen

COP21: Less than meets the eye

Marlowe Hood Monday 21 December 2015

Following the COP21 climate change accord struck in Paris earlier this month, many journalists, analysts, activists and even negotiators embedded in the climate change saga were left wondering, writes AFP's environment and science reporter Marlowe Hood.

"Six years – more than 20 if one starts the clock with the Rio Earth Summit – of maddeningly Byzantine negotiations, moving sideways or in circles as often as forward, have finally yielded a universal climate accord.  But what has truly been achieved?

"A lot."

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