PJL: February 2014 (Part 1)

Features and Essays

*Updated 4:02 a.m. For the third time in three months, and the second time this week, knife-wielding assailants have attacked a Chinese railway station. At approximately 11:30 a.m. on Tuesday, local time, four men stabbed people just outside a train station in the southern Chinese city of Guangzhou. Six people were injured, one critically, according to state-media reports. Local police said they shot one attacker on scene and captured another. Two suspects escaped. Photographs from the scene show what is becoming alarmingly common: blood on the pavement and bodies on the street. Last Wednesday, a bomb and knife attack at a railway station in the city of Urumqi, in China's far northwest, left three dead and dozens injured. On March 1, a coordinated assault on a railway station in Kunming, in southwestern China, left 33 dead and more than 100 injured. It is not yet clear if the incident in Guangzhou is related to what happened in Urumqi or Kunming. Chinese authorities blamed both those attacks on separatists from the country's predominantly Muslim Uighur minority. President Xi Jinping, who wrapped up a high-profile Xinjiang tour just before the Urumqi attack, last week announced plans to arm Chinese police officers with guns. In the wake of the recent spate of violence, he ordered the army to help local government deliver a "crushing blow" to terrorists. Details from Guangzhou are still scarce, but early eyewitness accounts suggest the attackers brandished long knives and chopped at passengers as they emerged from the station. A woman named Liu Yuying told China News Service, a Chinese news agency, that she was exiting the area when two assailants came out with "watermelon knives."      

Marcus Bleasdale–VII

Marcus Bleasdale: Bangui’s Inferno (Foreign Policy) Revenge and bloodletting in the Central African Republic

Jerome Delay: Central African Republic Soldiers Join Chaotic Violence (AP Big Story) Soldiers lynch suspected Seleka rebel fighter | Muslims flee Central African Republic’s Capital (AP Big Story)

Michael Zumstein: A Country Spiraling Out of Control (CNN Photos) Central African Republic

Comedian Jay Leno participates in a rally to protest draconian punishment of women and gay people announced by the Sultan of Brunei outside the Beverly Hills Hotel, which is owned by the Sultan, on May 5, 2014, in Beverly Hills, Calif.

Jerome Delay–AP

Jerome Delay: Looted Muslim Shops in Bangui (Guardian) All Muslim shops on the avenue leading to PK5 in Bangui, the capital of the Central African Republic, were looted as anti-Balaka militiamen pushed back Muslim factions, opening the gates for mass looting by Christian residents.

Ami Vitale: It Takes a Village to Protect a Rhino (NYT Lens) As Kenya makes efforts to save its critically endangered wildlife, like the white rhino, of which only eight remain, communities are learning the benefits of fighting poaching.

Jay Leno, Richard Branson and the Motion Picture & Television Fund slammed Brueni’s decision to implement an ultraorthodox form of Shariah law last week and have called for boycotts against hotels owned by the country’s leader. The new criminal code will allow the state to amputate the limbs of thieves, stone convicted adulterers and levy harsh punishments against abortion and homosexuality. "The decision to implement the (Shariah penal code) is not for fun but is to obey Allah's command as written in the Quran," said the sultan last week, according to the Associated Press. The new criminal codes can also be applied to Southeast Asian nation’s non-Muslim residents, who make up approximately one-third of the tiny country’s population. On Monday, former late night talk show host Jay Leno lead a demonstration in front of the Beverly Hills Hotel, which is part of the Dorchester Collection owned by the Brunei Investment Agency. "What is this, Berlin, 1933? This doesn't seem far off what happened in the Holocaust,” said Leno, during a protest in front of the Beverly Hills Hotel on Monday, according to AFP. "Come on people, it's 2014. Evil flourishes when good people do nothing." The Feminist Majority Foundation, which is co-chaired by Leno and his wife Mavis, announced that their annual Global Women's Rights Awards scheduled to take place at the Beverly Hills Hotel would be moved to another venue. Virgin Group’s founder Richard Bransen took to Twitter over the weekend to rail against the Sultan’s open disregard for human rights. No @Virgin employee, nor our family, will stay at Dorchester Hotels until the Sultan abides by basic human rights http://t.co/k1hMHAS5ft — Richard Branson (@richardbranson) May 3, 2014 However, Dorchester Collection's chief executive Christopher Cowdray rejected the boycotts and protest against the company as misguided. "American companies across the board are funded by foreign investment, including sovereign wealth funds," Christopher Cowdray said in a statement. [AP]

Meeri Koutaniemi–Echo

Meeri Koutaniemi: Blood, Fear and Ritual: Witness to Female Circumcision in Kenya (LightBox) The ritual of female circumcision is still valued in some 30 countries, mainly in Africa and the Middle East, under the belief that girls must be “cut” in order to prepare them for marriage.

Marcus Bleasdale: North Kivu: The Minerals of Blood (Paris Match L’Instant) Conflict minerals in Congo

Witnesses called by the defense team of Oscar Pistorius attempted to buttress the Paralympian’s assertion that he shot his girlfriend Reeva Steenkamp after mistaking her for an intruder. On Monday, Johan Stander and his daughter Carice Viljoen, who live close to the 27-year-old athlete, testified that they arrived at his Pretoria home soon after the fatal shooting and saw Pistorius urging Steenkamp to keep breathing. “Stay with me, my love, stay with me,” Viljoen told the court that Pistorius said to the dying Steenkamp, 29. “I just saw blood everywhere,” she added. “He kept on egging Reeva to just stay with him.” She added that she feared Pistorius might kill himself after emergency-response personnel asked him to fetch his deceased girlfriend's identification. "I was scared that he might shoot himself," Viljoen testified. The Blade Runner — so called because of his trademark prosthetic limbs — admits to shooting four times through the toilet door of his villa home with a 9-mm pistol on Feb. 14, 2013, but claims he thought an intruder lurked within. Steenkamp was wounded in the hip, arm and head and died shortly afterward. Stander, the manager of Pistorius' plush housing complex, testified that Pistorius phoned him about two minutes after the shooting at around 3:19 a.m. “I saw the truth there that morning. I saw it and I feel it,” Stander testified, adding that his famous neighbor was “really crying. He was in pain.” Chief prosecutor Gerrie Nel has forcefully argued that Pistorius had rowed with Steenkamp on the night in question and killed her deliberately in a fit of rage. He asked Stander if he was attempting to “assist” the defense of his friend. “I’m here to give the truth,” Stander replied. “And I think I’ve given the truth, what I saw that morning.” Pistorius faces 25 years to life in prison if convicted of premeditated murder, but also faces lesser charges of culpable homicide, discharging firearms in public and illegal possession of ammunition. He denies any wrongdoing. The case continues.

Jason Florio

Jason Florio: Source to Sea (The New Yorker’s Photo Booth) Photos from a trip along the Gambia River, one of Africa’s last major free-flowing rivers, from its source, in the highlands of Guinea, through Senegal and the Gambia, to its outlet, at the Atlantic Ocean.

Carolyn Drake: A Waldorf School in China (The New Yorker’s Photo Booth) The Chengdu Waldorf School

Massimo Vitali: The Empire State Building in Ice (New York Times Magazine) Ice and Snow World in Harbin, China

Updated: May 6, 2014, 4:28 a.m. E.T. For the third time in months, and the second time this week, knife-wielding assailants have attacked a Chinese railway station. At approximately 11:30 a.m. on Tuesday, local time, four men stabbed people just outside a train station in the southern Chinese city of Guangzhou. Six people were injured, one critically, according to state-media reports. Local police said they shot one attacker on scene and captured another. Two suspects escaped. Photographs from the scene show what is becoming alarmingly common: blood on the pavement and bodies on the ground. Last Wednesday, a bomb and knife attack at a railway station in the city of Urumqi, in China's far northwest, left three dead and dozens injured. On March 1, a coordinated assault on a railway station in Kunming, in southwestern China, left 33 dead and more than 100 injured. It is not yet clear if the incident in Guangzhou is related to what happened in Urumqi or Kunming. Chinese authorities blamed both those attacks on separatists from the country's predominantly Muslim Uighur minority. President Xi Jinping, who wrapped up a high-profile Xinjiang tour just before the Urumqi attack, last week announced plans to arm Chinese police officers with guns. In the wake of the recent spate of violence, he ordered the army to help local government deliver a "crushing blow" to terrorists. Details from Guangzhou are still scarce, but early eyewitness accounts suggest the attackers wore white hats and brandished long knives. A woman named Liu Yuying told China News Service, a Chinese news agency, that she was exiting the area when two assailants came out with "watermelon knives." The Guangzhou Journal reported that they carried blades a half-meter (or about 20 in.) long. Though the motive has yet to be determined, Chinese netizens were quick to connect the violence in Guangzhou to earlier incidents and condemn authorities for not doing enough to prevent mass attacks. "The counterterrorist effort is not enough," one person wrote. "The innocent people are paying the price."

Muhammed Muheisen–AP

Mohammed Muheisen: Afghan Refugee Children in Pakistan (AP Big Story) For more than three decades, Pakistan has been home to one of the world’s largest refugee communities: hundreds of thousands of Afghans who have fled the repeated wars and fighting in their country.

Abbas Hajimohammadi Saniabadi: Fragile Minds: Inside an Iranian Mental Hospital (LightBox) A poignant look at a Tehran mental hospital

Joachim Ladefoged: Turkey (New York Times Magazine) Ladefoged’s images from last summer’s protests in Istanbul accompany a magazine piece about the current state of the country

Guy Martin: City of Dreams (Panos Pictures) On the sets of Turkish soap operas, widely popular across the Arab world and Balkan countries

Jay Leno, Richard Branson and the Motion Picture & Television Fund have slammed Brunei’s decision to implement an ultraorthodox form of Shariah law last week and have called for boycotts against hotels owned by the oil-rich state. The new criminal code will allow courts to amputate the limbs of thieves, stone convicted adulterers and levy harsh punishments for abortions and homosexuality. "The decision to implement the [Shariah penal code] is not for fun but is to obey Allah's command as written in the Quran," said the country's billionaire leader Sultan Hassanal Bolkiah last week, according to the Associated Press. The new criminal codes can also be applied to the Southeast Asian nation’s non-Muslim residents, who make up approximately one-third of the tiny country’s population. On Monday, former late night talk show host Jay Leno led a protest in front of the iconic Beverly Hills Hotel, which is part of the Dorchester Collection owned by the state-run Brunei Investment Agency. "What is this, Berlin, 1933? This doesn't seem far off what happened in the Holocaust,” said Leno, according to AFP. "Come on people, it's 2014. Evil flourishes when good people do nothing." The Feminist Majority Foundation, which is co-chaired by Leno and his wife Mavis, announced this week that its annual Global Women's Rights Awards scheduled to take place at the Beverly Hills Hotel would be moved to another venue. Over the weekend, Virgin Group’s founder Richard Branson took to Twitter to rail against the Sultan’s open disregard for human rights. No @Virgin employee, nor our family, will stay at Dorchester Hotels until the Sultan abides by basic human rights http://t.co/k1hMHAS5ft — Richard Branson (@richardbranson) May 3, 2014 However, Dorchester Collection's chief executive Christopher Cowdray rejected the boycotts and dismissed the protests against the company as misguided. "American companies across the board are funded by foreign investment, including sovereign wealth funds," he said in a statement.

Yuri Kozyrev–NOOR for TIME

Yuri Kozyrev: Weird, Wonderful Sochi: Inside Russia’s Own Palm Beach (LightBox) In Soviet times Sochi was known as Russia’s version of Palm Beach

Davide Monteleone: Faces of Russia’s LGBT community (MSNBC) In a series of portraits, Rome-based photographer Davide Monteleone sought to convey a simple message about gay couples living in Russia.

Stanley Greene: Chechen Island (NOOR) Chechen Island is the first chapter of Stanley Greene’s long term project Hidden Scars – a photographic investigation into post-war Chechnya

The exterior of Community Hospital, where a patient with the first confirmed U.S. case of the Middle East Respiratory Syndrome is in isolation, is seen in Munster, Indiana, May 5, 2014

Elena Chernyshova

Elena Chernyshova: Russian Winter in Norilsk (NBC News) Chernyshova spent a year documenting the Russian arctic city of Norilsk. Polar nights leave the city in darkness 45 days a year.

Ross McDonnell: Fire and Ice in Kiev (LightBox) Photographs from the front line of Ukraine’s ongoing civil unrest

Maxim Dondyuk: Uprising in Ukraine (BusinessWeek)

Espen Rasmussen: Into the Wild (Foreign Policy) Greenland, on the cusp of momentous, perhaps irrevocable, change

Matteo Bastianelli: The Bosnian Identity (NYT Lens) A project that explores the hidden emotional wounds left by the 1992-95 war that changed the country.

Jay Leno, Richard Branson and the Motion Picture & Television Fund have slammed Brunei’s decision to implement an ultraorthodox form of Shari‘a law last week and have called for boycotts against hotels owned by the oil-rich state. The new criminal code will allow courts to amputate the limbs of thieves, stone convicted adulterers and levy harsh punishments for abortions and homosexuality. "The decision to implement the [Shari‘a penal code] is not for fun but is to obey Allah's command as written in the Quran," said the country's billionaire leader Sultan Hassanal Bolkiah last week, according to the Associated Press. The new criminal codes can also be applied to the Southeast Asian nation’s non-Muslim residents, who make up approximately one-third of the tiny country’s population. On Monday former late-night talk-show host Jay Leno led a protest in front of the iconic Beverly Hills Hotel, which is part of the Dorchester Collection owned by the state-run Brunei Investment Agency. "What is this, Berlin 1933? This doesn't seem far off what happened in the Holocaust,” said Leno, according to AFP. "Come on, people, it's 2014. Evil flourishes when good people do nothing." The Feminist Majority Foundation, which is co-chaired by Leno and his wife Mavis, announced this week that its annual Global Women's Rights Awards scheduled to take place at the Beverly Hills Hotel would be moved to another venue. Over the weekend, Virgin Group’s founder Richard Branson took to Twitter to rail against the Sultan’s open disregard for human rights. No @Virgin employee, nor our family, will stay at Dorchester Hotels until the Sultan abides by basic human rights http://t.co/k1hMHAS5ft — Richard Branson (@richardbranson) May 3, 2014 However, the Dorchester Collection's chief executive Christopher Cowdray rejected the boycotts and dismissed the protests against the company as misguided. "American companies across the board are funded by foreign investment, including sovereign wealth funds," he said in a statement.

Kenneth O Halloran for The New York Times

Kenneth O Halloran: Pilgrims’ Progress (NYT Magazine) In A.D. 441, St. Patrick, Ireland’s patron saint, climbed the third-highest mountain in County Mayo and, according to legend, spent 40 days and nights fasting and praying at its summit. Modern pilgrims inspired by his example still flock to what is now known as Croagh Patrick.

Edgar Martins: Inside the European Space Agency (Slate)

Jon Tonks: Empire (Guardian) Tristan da Cunha and St Helena are two of the world’s most remote islands, and the once-formidable British Empire’s most far-flung outposts.

Lucas Foglia: Frontcountry (The New Yorker’s Photo Booth) Foglia travelled across the American West, where he photographed the effects of a mining boom in the backcountry of Idaho, Montana, Nevada, New Mexico, Texas, and Wyoming.

Joana Toro: I Am Hello Kitty (NYT Lens) The photographer Joana Toro, who worked as Hello Kitty in Times Square, reveals her fellow Elmos and Mickeys to be immigrants like her, looking to make an extra dollar

Daniel Cronin: Jerusalem, Florida: The Holy Land Experience (CNN Photos) Every week, crowds bypass Orlando’s enticing theme parks and megamalls, opting instead to follow a blood-soaked Jesus impersonator as he heads for crucifixion on an immaculate Florida lawn.

Alex MacLean: Aerial Perspectives (Telegraph) MacLean’s images reveal the complexities and absurdities of contemporary life across America and Europe.

Emiliano Granado: Toughmudder (The New Yorker’s Photo Booth) Popular obstacle racing

Stephen Reiss: In the Bronx, 20 Kids and Counting (NYT Lens) In one busy home in the Bronx, a lesbian couple have raised 20 foster children in 10 years.

Ed Kashi: Health Crisis Among Sugar Cane Workers in Nicaragua (NYT Lens) Dismayed by the prevalence of kidney disease among Nicaraguan sugar cane workers, Ed Kashi is raising money to document the crisis and to spur dialogue. This slideshow includes his work so far.

Articles

Issouf Sanogo–AFP/Getty Images

Horrific but necessary photographs (AFP Correspondent) Sylvain Estibal, AFP’s photo chief for Europe and Africa, explains the thinking that went on before Issouf Sanogo’s photos of last week’s lynching in Central African Republic were shared on the wire.

Photographer: Central African Republic “Falling Apart” in “Horrific Violence” (National Geographic News) Marcus Bleasdale reports from the front lines of chaos

Fred Ritchin on Syrian Torture Archive: When Photographs of Atrocities Don’t Shock (LightBox) Ritchin writes on the power of photographs, or lack thereof, following the leak of a 55,000 photograph archive by a Syrian military police photographer documenting the deaths of some 11,000 detainees who had been executed, and in many cases tortured.

Susie Linfield: Advertisements for Death (NYT) On the recent cache of photos from Syrian jails and perpetrator images throughout history

Jay Leno, Richard Branson and the Motion Picture & Television Fund have slammed Brunei’s decision to implement an ultraorthodox form of Shari‘a law last week and have called for boycotts against hotels owned by the oil-rich state. The new criminal code will allow courts to amputate the limbs of thieves, stone convicted adulterers and levy harsh punishments for abortions and homosexuality. "The decision to implement the [Shari‘a penal code] is not for fun but is to obey Allah's command as written in the Quran," said the country's billionaire leader Sultan Hassanal Bolkiah last week, according to the Associated Press. The new criminal codes can also be applied to the Southeast Asian nation’s non-Muslim residents, who make up approximately one-third of the tiny country’s population. On Monday former late-night talk-show host Jay Leno led a protest in front of the iconic Beverly Hills Hotel, which is part of the Dorchester Collection owned by the state-run Brunei Investment Agency. "What is this, Berlin 1933? This doesn't seem far off what happened in the Holocaust,” said Leno, according to AFP. "Come on, people, it's 2014. Evil flourishes when good people do nothing." The Feminist Majority Foundation, which is co-chaired by Leno and his wife Mavis, announced this week that its annual Global Women's Rights Awards scheduled to take place at the Beverly Hills Hotel would be moved to another venue. Over the weekend, Virgin Group’s founder Richard Branson took to Twitter to rail against the Sultan’s open disregard for human rights. No @Virgin employee, nor our family, will stay at Dorchester Hotels until the Sultan abides by basic human rights http://t.co/k1hMHAS5ft — Richard Branson (@richardbranson) May 3, 2014 However, the Dorchester Collection's chief executive Christopher Cowdray rejected the boycotts and dismissed the protests against the company as misguided. "American companies across the board are funded by foreign investment, including sovereign wealth funds," he said in a statement.

foreignpolicy.com

James Traub: The Disappeared (Foreign Policy) Traub on the dangers facing journalists covering Syria

How To Get Arrested In Egypt: Work As A Journalist (BuzzFeed) The third deadliest country for reporters in 2013. “It’s never been as bad as it is nowadays,” Mosa’ab Elshamy says.

Photojournalist James Nachtwey Injured in Pre-Election Clashes in Bangkok (WSJ) More on Time here

For all the strides same-sex marriage advocates have made in recent years, a deep-red state with nothing on the ballot about the issue this year seems at first glance like an odd target for activists to set in their sights. But that's exactly what they're doing in Oklahoma. A pro-gay-marriage group deployed a statewide advertising campaign in Oklahoma on Monday. Evan Wolfson, founder and president of Freedom to Marry, a group helping to fund the campaign, said the absence of urgent public debate makes this the perfect time to reignite a conversation in Oklahoma that can be very emotionally charged, on both sides. “What we want to do is take this out of the political back and forth and just have a heart to heart conversation at a time when people have a chance to just take a deep breath and think it through,” Wolfson told TIME. “They’re being asked to open their hearts and think about real people and real values, such as the golden rule, and think about who gay people are in Oklahoma.” [youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BG3OJ_Xqn9c&w=600&h=350] The ad tells the story of the Cuyler family and their ranch near Fort Sill in rural, southwestern Oklahoma. At the ranch, decorated Vietnam veteran Ed Cuyler and his wife Robbie live with their daughter Deedra, her partner, Amber, and their three kids. Deedra and Amber were married in Massachusetts in 2011, but their marriage isn’t recognized in Oklahoma due to the state’s 2004 constitutional amendment banning recognition of same-sex marriages. With its rural aesthetic and the appeal to family values, the ad is designed for a wide swath of the state’s population, including people outside of the urban centers of Tulsa and Oklahoma City, a demographic not generally assumed to be sympathetic to arguments in favor of same-sex marriage. “We’d talk to legislators who would say, ‘There’s no gay people in my district,’” said Troy Stevenson of the Freedom Oklahoma coalition, which produced the ad with Freedom to Marry. “Well we know that’s not true." Stevenson met the Cuyler family in February during his group’s annual lobbying day at the state capital. Deedra and Amber came with their twins. Stevenson said after learning more about the family—with the kids, the ranch, and the father’s personal journey toward accepting his daughter’s family—he knew he’d found a couple for a TV spot. The ad comes as 10th Circuit Court Appeals is expected to rule within weeks on a challenge to Oklahoma’s same-sex marriage ban, which was overturned by a federal judge in Tulsa in a landmark ruling last January. In recent months Freedom to Marry has also run similar ads in Wyoming, New Mexico, Colorado and Utah, where a legal challenge to that state’s same-sex marriage ban is also being weighed by the 10thCircuit. The ads are part of Freedom to Marry’s national effort to cultivate support throughout the country for same-sex marriage in advance of the next time the Supreme Court takes up the issue, with the hope the court will find public opinion has shifted and Americans are ready for a sweeping decision legalizing same-sex marriage nationwide. The conventional wisdom says proponents of same-sex marriage face a steep uphill battle in Oklahoma. The Atlantic used aggregated polling data from the region in 2012 to find that 35 percent of Oklahomans support same-sex marriage, but reliable, up-to-date polling on the question doesn’t appear to exist. Freedom Oklahoma intends change that with a statewide poll after the ad run, with the goal of having data to sort through within the month. “It’s been an uphill battle all over the country,” Stevenson said. “Here in Oklahoma there’s a perception it’s going to be much harder. In talking to Oklahomans every day. I think there’s a lot more support than people understand.”

Brendan Hoffman–Getty Images

Behind Kiev’s barricades, against the odds (BJP) Beyond the attractive aesthetics of the fire and ice images that have come out of Ukraine, the current anti-government protests in the Eastern European country are an opportunity for freelance photographers to make their mark in a competitive media landscape dominated by the cult of the breaking news. Yet, as with other clashes, challenges exist

Photographer Fired by AP Says Decision Was Fair, But Process Wasn’t (PDN Pulse) Narciso Contreras comments on the saga surrounding his dismissal from AP

Confluence of ethics matters (NPPA) Thoughts on photojournalism ethics today by NPPA’s ethics committee members

The Guardian’s head of photography on a striking image from Pakistan (Guardian) The Guardian and the Times both chose the same image of a young Afghan girl from a choice of over 20,000

Visual Poetry: Erika Larsen Explores the World of Garrison Keillor (PROOF) Erika Larsen photographed Garrison Keillor’s hometown for “There’s No Place Like Home,” a personal narrative written by Keillor for the February issue of National Geographic magazine.

Alex Webb Reflects on the Kumbh Mela (PROOF) Webb spent a month experiencing this epic spiritual gathering in early 2013. His photographs appear in “Karma of the Crowd,” published in the February 2014 issue of National Geographic.

Alex Webb Looks Back in Black-and-White (NYT Lens) The photographer Alex Webb is known for his color work, but his black-and-white 1976 project documenting Mound Bayou, Miss., is the one he regrets not completing

Ed Kashi on documenting young Syrian refugees living in limbo (PROOF)

Ivan Kashinsky: Love Bloomed from the Darkroom to the Barrio (PROOF) Kashinsky is working on “Project Mi Barrio,” an ongoing essay in which he documents his rapidly changing neighborhood in Ecuador with his iPhone.

The Month in Photography (Guardian) Capa in Colour, David Lynch, Philip-Lorca diCorcia and Jessica Eaton feature in February’s guide to the best photography shows and books.

Mark Leong—Redux Pictures

Moving Walls 21 (Open Society Foundations) Moving Walls 21 features work by Shannon Jensen, Mark Leong, Diana Markosian, Nikos Pilos, and João Pina. The exhibit examines the refugee crisis in South Sudan resulting from conflict in Sudan’s Blue Nile state in 2012, Hong Kong’s evolving identity under China, the rise of Islamic fundamentalist values—and its impact on young women—in Chechnya, the financial collapse of Greece, and the legacy of South America’s “dirty wars.” | More on LightBox here

Judging the Photography Awards: How Much Art Is Too Much? (No Caption Needed)

Classic Lensman, Using Full Palette (NYT) Review of International Center of Photography’s ‘Capa in Color’ exhibit

Saul Leiter: The anti-celebrity photographer (Telegraph) Saul Leiter was immensely talented, revered, and spent much of his life successfully avoiding the limelight. A year after his death, is that about to change?

Rescued from war-torn Bangui: photographer Samuel Fosso’s life work (Guardian) Photographers chronicling violence in Central African Republic recount their extraordinary discovery and rescue of prints and negatives after Fosso’s studio was attacked by looters | More on the Lens blog here

Instagram Envy Chain: Sochi Edition (NYT Magazine 6th Floor blog) How Russian photojournalists were covering Sochi on their Instagram accounts

Happy 100th birthday, Leica! (Guardian) As the world’s original mobile camera celebrates its centenary, Guardian photographers send their birthday messages to the little black box that changed their world

Magda Rakita

Featured photographer: Magda Rakita (Verve Photo) Polish photographer based in London

Featured photographer: Marion Gambin (Verve Photo) French photographer based in Paris

Featured photographer: Javad Parsa (Verve Photo) Iranian photographer based in Oslo

Interviews and Talks

A civilian diver helping to search for dozens of people still missing from the doomed South Korean ferry died Tuesday after getting into trouble while scouring the sunken hulk. The 53-year-old was pulled to the surface by fellow divers after becoming uncommunicative about five minutes into his first search of the stricken Sewol, the Associated Press reports. The ill-fated vessel departed the port city of Incheon with 476 people on board but capsized off South Korea's southwest coast on April 16. More than 300 people are confirmed dead or are still missing, mostly teenagers on a high school outing to the resort island of Jeju. Twenty-two of the 29 crew members survived, of whom all 15 responsible for the ship’s navigation — including the captain — have been arrested and face various charges including possible negligent homicide. Four others connected with Chonghaejin Marine, the company that ran the ferry, have also been detained. Despite the diver’s death, others continued their searches Tuesday, buoyed by improving weather and lessening ocean currents. Investigators believe the remaining bodies yet to be recovered will be found in 64 of the ship's 111 areas. Investigators continue to probe into allegations of unsafe modifications and overloading of cargo as possibly being behind the tragedy. The ferry was carrying an estimated 3,608 tons of cargo, more than three times what was deemed safe by marine authorities, according to official documents. It also apparently had shed much of the ballast water necessary to maintain stability to accommodate the extra freight. The sinking has shocked the nation, and 1.1 million South Koreans had paid respects at 131 memorial altars by Sunday. President Park Geun-hye again criticized the role played by the ferry operator and government officials during an address Tuesday to mark the Buddha’s birthday at a temple in Seoul. "Safety rules that must be observed were not followed because of worldly desires, and irresponsible acts that tolerated those injustices have resulted in death," she said.

David Guttenfelder

David Guttenfelder (FLTR) Shift in power: Guttenfelder on the impact and importance of smartphone photography | “There’s a whole language being developed – the power structure is being turned on its head,” says David Guttenfelder, who speaks to FLTR about what attracted him to the smartphone

Kathy Ryan (FLTR) Before Instagram, Kathy Ryan, director of photography at The New York Times Magazine, rarely took any pictures. But the discovery of social platform changed that – so much so, that she even curated Aperture’s first Instagram Silent Auction last year. She tells FLTR about the impact smartphone photography has had on contemporary photographic culture

Moises Saman (Vice) Saman on his work and the upcoming book on revolution in Egypt and the wider Arab world

Olivia Arthur (Vice) Arthur photographs a side of women the West rarely sees

Ron Haviv (NBC News) Haviv spoke to NBC’s Ann Curry in an interview for Depth of Field, a series of intimate conversations with the world’s leading photojournalists who reveal the stories behind their most provocative and acclaimed images

Hanif Ali picks through the remains of what used to be his home, looking for his wife’s gold jewelry. Three nights before, on the evening of May 2, eyewitnesses say men in khaki clothing stormed this isolated village of Khagrabari in western Assam, attacking its Muslim residents and burning down their homes. Ali, his wife and his daughter survived the raid, but many of their neighbors did not. Twenty villagers, including many women and children, died that evening in the latest fit of bloodshed in the northeastern state. “Everything is gone,” says Ali. “What good will peace do me now?” Last week, more than 30 Muslims were killed in two districts of western Assam, a state better known outside India for its verdant tea gardens than its simmering insurgency. For residents, it was an unwelcome return to the violence that periodically stalks this remote part of India when tensions boil up between members of the local Bodo community and Muslim residents. In 2012, clashes between Bodos and Muslims, some of whom are migrants from neighboring Bangladesh, left dozens dead and displaced many thousands more. Local police are blaming last week’s killings in Kokrajhar and Baksa districts on a faction of the National Democratic Front of Bodoland (NDFB), a militant group fighting for an independent Bodo homeland. Since the killings, Indian security forces have ramped up operations against the group, though it has denied any involvement in the killings. Outside Assam, as national elections enter their final weeks, the violence has prompted a fresh war of words between national parties about the treatment of minority groups in India. Leaders of the incumbent Congress Party, which projects a secular platform, and its allies have seized on the incident as an example of the divisive influence of the Hindu nationalist Bhartiya Janata Party (BJP), which is forecast to win the largest number of seats in the parliamentary elections underway. Both the BJP and its prime ministerial candidate Narendra Modi have spoken out against illegal immigration of Muslims from Bangladesh in the past, which their critics say fans tensions in a state where the issue is already a polarizing factor. “In Assam, 30 Muslims were murdered. Why? Because BJP prime ministerial candidate Narendra Modi made a speech there and tried to incite people against Muslims,” Omar Abdullah, chief minister of Jammu and Kashmir, said at a rally in his state on Saturday, according to Indian media. “This truth cannot be denied.” The same day, union minister and Congress party senior leader Kapil Sibal also lashed out at Modi, saying his name stands for “a model of dividing India.” Taking a stand against illegal immigration is not new for the BJP. After the 2012 Assam riots, senior BJP leader LK Advani blamed the bloodshed on unchecked illegal immigration from Bangladesh, by creating competition for resources between communities and general insecurity among Bodos. This week, the BJP quickly shot back at Congress for its comments, and, instead of backing down from the issue, at a Sunday rally in West Bengal Modi reiterated his position against illegal immigrants days after the killings. “Those who come here for vote bank politics and take away jobs of our youth will have to go back,” he said. It’s impossible to measure, of course, what if any role political rhetoric actually played in last week’s violence. A handful of militant groups have been operating in the area for years. Though some have officially agreed to a ceasefire, the ongoing availability of arms in the region seems a more fundamental culprit in the feeding the cycle of violence that both Bodos and Muslims alike are forced to live with. After widespread displacement in the state less than two years ago, hundreds of people are now back in relief camps, terrified to return home lest more armed men come to their homes in the night again. Pramad Bodo, president of the All Bodo Students Union, says he does not think last week’s killings were religiously motivated. But, he says, everyone is weary of the seemingly fruitless fight between militants and security forces. “Bodo or Muslim — people are angry,” he says. “If the extremists are involved [this time], what has the government been doing?” — With reporting by Arijit Sen in Assam  

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An Indian resident salvages valuables in the remains of his house in the village of Khagrabari, some 200 km west of Guwahati on May 3, 2014, after it was attacked by tribal separatists in India's remote northeastern state of Assam

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Mikko Takkunen is an associate photo editor at TIME.com. Follow him on Twitter @photojournalism.

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