Muhammed's Hope. The heart wrenching story of one Syrian boy.

Muhammed Qamand is 8,  he is from the Ansari Sharqy area of Aleppo in Syria. On May 2nd 2013 Muhammed and his family were visiting grandparents in the area of Bab Al Hadid when Assad's air force attacked the rebel held area. The blast resulted in the death of his Grandparents, Uncle, his Mother and his brother. Muhammed's legs were blown off and his cousin received facial injuries. He was just 5 years old. Muhammed and his father eventually made it over the Turkish border through rebel held areas. He now lives in Istanbul with his father. Muhammed is currently waiting for surgery to his legs to remove all of the shrapnel and to prepare them for new prosthetic legs. Muhammed will require many follow-up medical procedures as he grows and the leg bones continues to grow. 
 He is under a care program with MedChild International, an NGO based out of the United States run by Scottish born Jan Maren Innes. MedChild help children from war zones and disaster zones, also children with congenital health issues. MedChild will soon hold an online photo auction to raise funds, they will also donate some of the money raised to the James Foley Legacy Foundation, Jan was a friend of Foley's and had been talking with him about holding a photo auction to raise money to help children before he was killed in Syria last year, they will also donate to Sebastian Junger's RISC (Reporters Instructed in Saving Colleagues) Training. With a planned launch of 2016 for MedChild Jan decided to move things forward as she had been presented with cases which she knew she could help now, so brought the timetable forward to this year. MedChild are unique in that they will provide Muhammed's care until he turns 18, as they do with all cases.  

Odds for photojournalists get shorter...

   These are harrowing times that we live in, with war on nearly every continent, and it seems to be getting worse. Throughout my time as a freelance photographer girlfriends and my late wife have always said very early on in the relationship, "no motorbikes, no warzones!! Or else!"
   Following the recent release of  the Reporters Without Borders annual report into the number of journalists displaced, kidnapped or murdered it would seem my overprotective partners had the right idea. Check out the facts;

2012 in numbers
88 journalists killed (+33%)
879 journalists arrested 1993 journalists threatened or physically attacked
38 journalists kidnapped
73 journalists fled their country
6 media assistants killed
47 netizens and citizen-journalists killed
144 bloggers and netizens arrested

Perhaps most worrying is the fact that there has been an 840% increase in the amount of netizens and citizen-journalists killed in the past 12 months. A 33% increase in the amount of journalists killed and a 46% increase in the amount of journalists kidnapped. To get some perspective remember 63 journalists were killed in the 8 year period(1965-1973) of the American involvement in Vietnam.

The Top 5 most dangerous places for journalists in 2012 were;

1.Syria
2.Somalia
3.Pakistan
4.Mexico
5.Brazil

This has been the worst year for journalist casualties since Reporters Without Borders began compiling these reports back in 1995.

You can check out the full report by following this link to download the report as a PDF;  http://fr.rsf.org/IMG/pdf/bilanannuelgb.pdf

Just think...11 years ago on the 23rd of January 2002, US journalist Daniel Pearl was kidnapped by a Pakistani militant group while on his way to an interview with Sheikh Mubarak Ali Gilani in Karachi, Pakistan. Emails were sent to the United States with a number of demands in exchange for Pearl's release. Despite the United States' efforts, nine days later Pearl was beheaded.

As I write this photojournalist James Foley has been missing for 63 days in Syria. Check out the Free James Foley site here; www.freejamesfoley.org

 American journalist Austin Tice has also been missing since Aug. 13 2012. A video surfaced on Oct. 1 2012 showing Tice in the custody of foreign Islamic fighters.(Austin Tice...Kidnappers Video??) But the video's authenticity has been questioned. The US State Department has asked the Syrian government to be “more forthcoming” with information about the missing journalist. But the Syrian government says it has no information about Tice's whereabouts.

 On August 20 2012, (156 days ago!!!)  Palestinian-Jordanian Bashar Fahmi Al-Kadumi, with the Arabic-language television channelAl-Hurra, also disappeared in the northern province of Aleppo with his colleague, Cuneyt Unal, who has since been released.