'World Press Photo of the Year'

The picture of a veiled Yemeni woman holding an injured relative in her arms has been selected as press photo of the year at the "World Press Photo Awards 2012." Photographer Samuel Aranda took the picture on October 15, 2011 in a mosque in Yemen's capital of Sanaa during a demonstration against President Ali Abdullah Salih. It speaks to the unrest in the entire region, as the World Press Photo Award jury emphasized last Friday during a press conference in Amsterdam's city hall. "It represents Yemen, Egypt, Libya, and Syria – everything that has happened during the Arab Spring." 5,247 photographers from 124 countries submitted a total of 101,254 photographs to the competition. The award, which is being presented for the 55th time in 2012, is considered the most important international award for press photography and the world's biggest competition of its kind. Gruner + Jahr will once again present the German premiere of the "World Press Photo" exhibition from May 4 to June 3; it will open on May 3 at the G+J Pressehaus.

Photos by German photographer and filmmaker Carsten Peter are among the award-winning images of this year's "World Press Photo Awards." He won second place in the category "Nature, Stories" for his photos of the descent into Vietnam’s Son Doong caves, which were published in issue 4/2011 of "National Geographic Deutschland" in the article entitled "Inside Vietnam's belly."

"National Geographic Deutschland" has already published numerous nature photos by Carsten Peters: for issue 10/2011 he photographed an expedition to the Blue Mountains; for issue 6/2011 he documented the Nyiragongo, Africa's most dangerous volcano. In addition, Carsten Peter served as a photographer and author of the book "On Location – Die Welt der Naturfotografie" ("On Location – The World of Nature Photography"), in which "National Geographic" united five of the world’s best nature photographers in a photo book. Carsten Peters has received several awards: the biologist won the "World Press Photo Award" in 2005 for his tornado photos, and recently, on January 13, 2012, the "National Geographic" photographers gave him the title ‘best "NG" photographer’.