Eva Luise Köhler honors the Danish photographer
Jan Grarup
The Danish photographer Jan Grarup
is the winner of the international photo competition
“UNICEF Photo of the Year”. His photo shows
five-year-old Rahila, who after the devastating earthquake
in Pakistan last October received medical treatment.
“The UNICEF Photo of the Year 2006 is a symbol
of survival. The girl’s smile is an expression
of gratitude to all, who have helped the victims of
nature disasters in recent years. It should encourage
all of us not to forget children in need, even when
they are no longer the focus of media attention”,
said Eva Luise Köhler, patroness of UNICEF Germany,
at the award ceremony in Berlin. According to UNICE,
international relief operations last winter prevented
death on a massive scale in the disaster area. However,
many families will once again have to get through the
coming winter in tents or makeshift shelters.
For the competition, inviting entries
from throughout the world, 111 photographers from 28
countries submitted a total of 1,034 pictures. This
year, the jury, under the chairmanship of Klaus Honnef,
professor for the theory of photography, chose the winners
of the first, second and third prize and made nine other
honorable mentions. Presenting this award for the seventh
time, UNICEF is honoring photographs of high artistic
and photojournalistic quality that capture the living
conditions of children. The competition is supported
by the magazine GEO and Citibank Germany.
The Winning Photograph
Jan Grarup took the UNICEF Photo of the Year 2006 about
three weeks after the earthquake in Muzzafarabad, the
provincial capital of Pakistani Kashmir. Five-year-old
Rahila was one of the many seriously injured girls and
boys at the children’s ward of the local hospital.
Doctors had applied traction to both her legs, which
had suffered compound fractures. For health care reasons,
she had been flown out by helicopter from her home village.
The flight saving Rahila took only half an hour. “Her
smile amid all the grief and despair had a great impact
on me. This little girl shows just how much resilience
children have”, said Grarup, who has received
the UNICEF award once before in 2002.
Emergency aid for the
victims of the earthquake in Kashmir
The earthquake on the 8th of October 2005 killed more
than 70,000 people, including 18,000 children, in the
region of Kashmir. 3.3 million people lost their homes,
and even today around 30,000 of them are still living
in camps. 1.5 million people still have no adequate
access to safe drinking water. UNICEF is committed to
a major reconstruction program. In cooperation with
international and local partners, UNICEF is rebuilding
or repairing schools, health centers and water works,
and supporting the provision of medical and psychological
care for children, who have suffered long-term disabilities
as a result of the disaster. More than 320,000 children
of primary school age are back in school, most attending
one of the nearly 2,500 tent schools.
The five year old Rahila is
all smiles. She is a patient of the Red Cross
Hospital in the northern Pakistani city of Muzaffarabad.
An extension bandage covers her legs because she
broke her lower leg and thigh during the devastating
earthquake of 10/8/2005. But nevertheless she
is all smiles, as if she was perfectly fine.
Three weeks after the earthquake
Danish photographer Jan Grarup traveled to Pakistan.
He took a flight to Muzaffarabad, the capital
of the Pakistani part of Kashmir. The earthquake
measuring 7.6 on the Richter scale almost completely
destroyed the city. More than 70,000 inhabitants
of the Kashmir region died in the earthquake,
18,000 of which were children. 3.3 million Kashmiris
lost their homes and after one full year 30,000
people are said to still live in emergency camps.
Rahila was one of many gravely
injured girls and boys in the children’s
department of the local hospital. The doctors
covered her multiple fractured legs with an extension
bandage. In order to give her medical treatment
she had to be evacuated by helicopter from her
village. The flight that saved Rahila’s
life took half an hour.
“I was so impressed
by her smile amidst all the grief and despair”,
says Grarup, a second time winner of the UNICEF
award. “The little girl is living proof
of the strength that lies in children.”
Hajira (8 years old) recycles thousands
of batteries, by bursting them using a simple hammer,
one at a time. She works with her mother and also helps
to look after her siblings Mumtaz (3 years old, girl)
and Yasmin (1 year old). They get Taka 6 for cleaning
1000 carbon rods. Hajira cleans between 1000-3000 carbon
rods per day. During a short break from her work, Hajira
laughs standing on the door of the workshop. She is
carrying her sister Mumtaz in her arms. Her face is
blackened with carbon dust from recycled batteries.
On the outskirts of Dhaka by the river Buriganga, several
workshops specialize in recycling different materials
found in dumpsites. One such industry deals specifically
with the recycling of D-size dry-cell batteries. They
employ hundreds of women and children. For all day long
they break thousand of used batteries to get tiny pieces
of metal out of them. During recycling process, these
women and children inhale millions of toxic dust from
batteries throughout the day. Depending on how much
work they do, they earn between 6 to15 Taka (10 to 25
US cents) per day.
“ I am not against child labour. I know, how many
important opportunities it provides. It can change lives.
For many children, earning a living or supplementing
family’s income is a matter of survival. However,
there is a difference between a child who works in a
garment factory or in a restaurant and one who is exploited
in a hazmat recycling ghetto or a brothel, “ Shezad
Noorani says, who himself grew up as childworker in
Bangladesh and lives now in the USA
Roma (4 years old), Svieta (5 years
old), Sergiey (12 years old) are living during the fall
and winter on hot pipes. The place is filthy and very
humid. There are plenty of rats, almost no light, except
home made candles. During daytime children beg in the
subway.
The Polish photographer Hanna Polak
accompanied homeless children in Moscow. Alcoholic parents,
poverty - stricken homes, and, in many cases, family
violence, force children out of their homes and onto
the streets, usually ending their dreams of a better
life.
The children come to Moscow
from all over the former Soviet Republic. Some are lucky
to find a simple trade to earn a living, but most survive
by begging, stealing, and prostitution. They sleep in
underground sewage tunnels, on hot water pipes, in abandoned
attics and staircases. Some live in garbage containers
or build shacks at garbage dumps. These “invisible”
children of Russia get addicted to drugs, cigarettes,
and alcohol at a very young age, many as early as four
or five years old. If not from drugs, many homeless
Russian children perish at the hands of pedophiles,
or from hunger and frost during extreme Russian winters.
Some attempt suicide and many succeed. Those who survive
are doomed for degradation, and, in most cases, join
the ranks of a great army of young criminals.
