In Memoriam: Anja Niedringhaus (1965—2014)

4 minute read

Afghanistan, with its stark landscapes, indigo skies and diverse population, has always been a photojournalists’ dream assignment. Ever since the sandaled mujahidin first used their rocket propelled grenades against the invading Soviet army, photographers have been infected with the country’s eerie beauty, sucked back time and again as the story cycled through civil war, the Taliban era, the American war and finally a fragile peace capped by presidential elections that promised at least a glimmer of stability.

And no one has covered that story as well as German photographer Anja Niedringhaus, a dedicated correspondent who lost her life on April 4 covering preparations for those elections, when she and her Associated Press colleague Kathy Gannon were shot by a uniformed Afghan police officer in Khost Province. “In Afghanistan of all places. It is just so tragic that this would have happened to her there,” says an old friend and fellow photojournalist Moises Saman. “She was just really committed to that country in particular. You could see it in the sensitivity of her work, her understanding of that country.”

Afghanistan Photographer Killed
AP photographer Anja Niedringhaus in Rome, 2005.Peter Dejong—AP

Gannon, 60, has undergone surgery and is likely to survive, according to the Associated Press, but Niedringhaus, 48, died instantly. Both were veteran Afghan hands who had worked together for years, lending a deep, nuanced take on a country that resists superficial explorations. “I have never met journalists more passionate about the people of Afghanistan than Anja and Kathy,” says a colleague, who asked not to be named pending permission to comment from AP. “They visited more of the country than any other journalist, and Anja showed a side of Afghanistan that few have ever seen. It’s just a devastating loss.”

Afghanistan, once a relatively safe place to work, has become increasingly deadly for journalists in the run up to the elections. Just last month Swedish-British radio reporter Nils Horner was shot dead in downtown Kabul. Days later Sardar Ahmad of the Agence France Press was gunned down, along with his wife and two children, in an attack on a luxury hotel in Kabul. His youngest son, two-year-old Abuzar, survived several gunshot wounds.

Nor were Gannon and Niedringhaus taking unnecessary risks. They were traveling with election officials in a convoy guarded by government soldiers. Like most correspondents out in the provinces, they took basic precautions against roadside bombs and Taliban ambushes. “They followed the best case scenario for going to tricky areas,” says Saman. “They were experienced combat reporters. But how can you prepare for the time when someone who is supposed to be protecting you turns on you? It’s impossible.”

Niedringhaus, who shared a Pulitzer Prize for her work covering the Iraq war, always stood out for her infectious enthusiasm and good cheer, “even under the darkest of circumstances,” says AP Vice President and Director of Photography Santiago Lyon. “She consistently volunteered for the hardest assignments and was remarkably resilient in carrying them out time after time. She truly believed in the need to bear witness.” She also believed, say friends, in making the best of a bad situation, and could always be counted on to travel with a stash of good cheese, chocolate and wine even to the most remote of locations. And she would share her provisions generously.

Her laugh was loud, and contagious. It didn’t matter if she was traveling with someone new to Afghanistan or a veteran, say friends. She treated everyone she met with the same kindness, generosity and humor.

Even though Niedringhaus made her name as a combat photographer, she didn’t really fit the stereotype, says Saman. “When you say ‘war photographer’ the first image that comes to mind is someone crazy for the bang bang. Not Anja. She was an artist. She used her sensitivity and sense of understanding to access the human side of war.” And she never let the darkness of her work turn her bitter and cynical, sometimes a hazard of the occupation. “She was just so hungry for adventure, and I was struck by her directness and her utter fearlessness,” says former Islamabad correspondent for the AP Nahal Toosi, now deputy political editor at Politico. “I thought, ‘Wow, I could follow this woman into battle!’” Many did, and benefitted from the experience.

This post was updated at 12:30 p.m. EST on April 4.

IRAQ
Iraqi women gesture as they line up to visit arrested family members outside the prison in Abu Ghraib, in the outskirts of Baghdad, Iraq, May 11, 2004.Anja Niedringhaus—AP
TOPIX IRAQ
US Marines of the 1st Division raid the house of a city council chairman in the Abu Ghraib district of Baghdad, Iraq, Nov. 2, 2004.Anja Niedringhaus—AP
IRAQ PULITZER PHOTOS
A U.S. Marine of the 1st Division carries a mascot for good luck in his backpack as his unit pushed further into the western part of Fallujah, Iraq, Nov. 14, 2004.Anja Niedringhaus—AP
TOPIX IRAQ
U.S. Marines of the 1st Division take position on the outskirts of Fallujah, Iraq, Nov. 8, 2004.Anja Niedringhaus—AP
TOPIX IRAQ MEMORIAL
U.S. Marines line up during a memorial service for 31 U.S. servicemen at Camp Korean Village, near Ar Rutbah, western Iraq, Feb. 2, 2005.Anja Niedringhaus—AP
Mideast Libya
A Libyan rebel prays next to his gun on the frontline of the outskirts of the city of Ajdabiya, south of Benghazi, eastern Libya, March 21, 2011.Anja Niedringhaus—AP
Obit Anja Niedringhaus Photo Gallery
An Afghan woman waits in a changing room to try out a new Burqa, in a shop at in the old city of Kabul, April 11, 2013.Anja Niedringhaus—AP
APTOPIX Afghanistan Nowruz
Hundreds of Afghans wait to see the holy flag at the Kart-e Sakhi mosque in Kabul, March 21, 2013.Anja Niedringhaus—AP
APTOPIX Afghanistan
An Afghan man jumps from a diving board into a swimming pool on a hill overlooking Kabul, Afghanistan, Friday, May 17, 2013.Anja Niedringhaus—AP
APTOPIX Afghanistan Daily Life
In one of Niedringhaus' most poignant photographs from her immense career of covering conflict, here's a quieter moment from a factory on the outskirts of Kabul on Nov 7, 2013.Anja Niedringhaus—AP
APTOPIX Afghanistan
An Afghan man on his donkey follows a convoy of German ISAF soldiers patrolling Yaftal E Sofla, in the mountainous region of Feyzabad, on Sept. 15, 2009, east of Kunduz, Afghanistan.Anja Niedringhaus—AP
Afghanistan Canada
A Canadian soldier with the 1st RCR Battle Group, The Royal Canadian Regiment, chases a chicken seconds before he and his unit were attacked by grenades shot over the wall during a patrol in Salavat, southwest of Kandahar, Afghanistan, Sept. 11, 2010.Anja Niedringhaus—AP
Afghanistan Security Forces Tested
An Afghan Army soldier adjusts his helmet at a training facility on the outskirts of Kabul, May 8, 2013.Anja Niedringhaus—AP
Obit Anja Niedringhaus Photo Gallery
A US Marine on his way to pick up food supplies after they were dropped off by small parachutes from a plane outside Forward Operating Base Edi in the Helmand Province of southern Afghanistan, June 9, 2011.Anja Niedringhaus—AP
Veterans Day-Combat Photo Gallery
A German soldier lifts weights at his combat outpost in Char Darah, outisde Kunduz, Afghanistan, Sept. 17, 2011.Anja Niedringhaus—AP
Afghanistan Canada
A Canadian soldier with the 1st Battalion, The Royal Canadian Regiment rests next to his guns after a mission in Khebari Ghar in the Panjwayi district, south-west of Kandahar, Afghanistan, June 3, 2010.Anja Niedringhaus—AP
APTOPIX Obit Anja Niedringhaus Photo Gallery
Injured U.S.Marine Cpl. Burness Britt reacts after being lifted onto a medevac helicopter from the U.S. Army's Task Force Lift "Dust Off," Charlie Company 1-214 Aviation Regiment, June 4, 201, in the Helmand Province of southern Afghanistan.Anja Niedringhaus—AP
APTOPIX Afghanistan Medevac
Lance Cpl. Blas Trevino, center, from the 1st Battalion, 5th Marines, shouts as he is brought onto a medevac helicopter from the U.S. Army's Task Force Lift "Dust Off", Charlie Company 1-214 Aviation Regiment after he got shot in the stomach, outside Sangin, June 11, 2011, in the Helmand Province of southern Afghanistan.Anja Niedringhaus—AP
APTOPIX Afghanistan
An Afghan boy looks on as German ISAF soldiers prepare a temporary camp to overnight during a long term patrol in the mountainous region of Feyzabad, east of Kunduz, Afghanistan, Sept. 14, 2009.Anja Niedringhaus—AP
Afghanistan US Junk
Afghans load pieces of a a destroyed U.S military armored car into their vehicle at a junk yard in Kandahar, southern Afghanistan, Nov. 2, 2013.Anja Niedringhaus—AP
APTOPIX Afghanistan Daily Life
An Afghan boy flies his kite on a hill overlooking Kabul, Afghanistan, May 13, 2013.Anja Niedringhaus—AP
APTOPIX Afghanistan Opium
Afghan school boys leave the fields after helping to prepare the soil for poppy seeds in Cham Kalai village in Afghanistan's eastern Nangarhar province, an area which is largely controlled by Taliban, Nov. 12, 2013.Anja Niedringhaus—AP
Afghanistan Daily Life
Afghani schoolgirls play volleyball with a basketball during a break at their girls school in the old town of Kabul, April 7, 2013.Anja Niedringhaus—AP
APTOPIX Afghanistan KarzaiÕs Legacy
An Afghan carpet seller holds up a framed carpet depicting Afghan President Hamid Karzai in his store in Kabul, March 30, 2014.Anja Niedringhaus—AP
APTOPIX Afghanistan
Pakistani bank notes covered in blood are displayed on the body of a dead suicide bomber after police found them in his pocket in the center of Kandahar, Afghanistan, March 12, 2014, after an attack on the former Afghan intelligence headquarters.Anja Niedringhaus—AP
Afghanistan Elections
Afghan election workers take a tea break while a security guard stretches in the afternoon sun outside the Independent Election Commission office in the eastern Afghan city of Khost, April 3, 2014.Anja Niedringhaus—AP
APTOPIX Afghanistan Women's Struggle
Afghan women cross a cemetery in the center of Kabul, March 7, 2014.Anja Niedringhaus—AP
APTOPIX Afghanistan Election
An Afghan soldier, left, and a police man peek through a window as they queue with others to get their registration card on the last day of voter registration for the upcoming presidential elections outside a school in Kabul, April 1, 2014.Anja Niedringhaus—AP
Afghanistan Daily Life
Afghan women beg in the street for money in the center of Kandahar, Afghanistan, March 12, 2014.Anja Niedringhaus—AP
Afghanistan KarzaiÕs Legacy
A picture of Afghan President Hamid Karzai hangs on a wall in the main room of the district municipality in eastern Kabul, March 29, 2014.Anja Niedringhaus—AP

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