National & International News

The work and legacy of photographer Anja Niedringhaus endure 10 years after her death

By Hannah Bloch,

Virginia Lozano

Published April 4, 2024 at 4:51 PM EDT

In this photo made by Associated Press photographer Anja Niedringhaus, an Afghan boy flies his kite on a hill overlooking Kabul, Afghanistan, May 13, 2013.

"I do my job simply to report people's courage with my camera and with my heart," Anja Niedringhaus said in 2005.

The acclaimed German photojournalist, known best for her work covering conflict for The Associated Press in the Middle East and Afghanistan, was killed 10 years ago, on April 4, 2014, while on assignment covering Afghanistan's elections. An Afghan policeman shot her as she sat in a car with close friend and colleague Kathy Gannon, AP's longtime senior correspondent in Afghanistan and Pakistan, who was also shot and survived the attack with severe wounds.

An Afghan female prisoner, Nuria, with her infant boy at Badam Bagh, Afghanistan's central women's prison, in Kabul, March 28, 2013.

U.S. Marine Cpl. Burness Britt reacts after being lifted onto a U.S. Army medevac helicopter, June 4, 2011. Britt was wounded in Afghanistan's Helmand province. Niedringhaus held Britt's hand in the helicopter and noticed a piece of wheat stuck to his shirt. She picked it up and saved it, then gave it to him months later when she visited him in the hospital. He told her it was his lucky charm.

Iraqi women reach out with empty water containers as British soldiers arrive to supply the outskirts of Iraq's southern city of Basra with drinking water, April 4, 2003.

On Thursday, the Bronx Documentary Center in New York City is launching a new book and exhibition of Niedringhaus' work, co-curated by Gannon. A ceremony at the center will honor Palestinian freelance photojournalist Samar Abu Elouf with the Anja Niedringhaus Courage In Photojournalism Award, given by the International Women's Media Foundation.

Niedringhaus' Pulitzer Prize-winning "work helped define the wars in Iraq, Afghanistan, and Libya," AP photo editors Jacqueline Larma and Enric Marti write. "And despite her reputation as a war photographer, very often she found beauty and joy on assignment — even in those difficult places where she spent so much time. And especially in the place where she ultimately lost her life."

Niedringhaus' images show glimpses of daily life, tenderness, humor and tragedy. "She wasn't covering a war. She wasn't covering a country. She was covering a people," Gannon tells CNN.

"I could have stayed out of trouble most of my life," Niedringhaus said in 2005, "but always have been drawn to the people, no matter where, who suffer in difficult situations."

Here is a selection of Anja Niedringhaus' work — indelible images that continue to resonate today.

A nomad kisses his young daughter while watching his herd in Marjah, Helmand province, Afghanistan, Oct. 20, 2012.

Palestinians enjoy a ride at an amusement park outside Gaza City, March 26, 2006.

Hundreds of Afghans wait to see the holy flag at the Kart-e Sakhi mosque in Kabul, Afghanistan, March 21, 2013.

An Afghan woman holds her newborn baby wrapped in her burqa as she waits to get in line to try on a new burqa in a shop in Kabul, Afghanistan, April 11, 2013.

Pakistani Army soldiers with the 20th Lancers Armored Regiment gather before a patrol atop the 8,000-foot mountain near their outpost along the Pakistan-Afghan border, Feb. 20, 2012.

An Afghan soldier, left, and a policeman peek through a window as they queue with others to get their registration cards on the last day of voter registration for presidential elections, outside a school in Kabul, Afghanistan, April 1, 2014. Niedringhaus was killed on April 4, 2014.

An Afghan man with his five children on his motorbike pays money to enter a park in Kandahar, southern Afghanistan, Nov. 1, 2013.

A young Pakistani girl works on her midterm papers in a school in Mingora, Swat Valley, Pakistan, on Oct. 5, 2013, a year after Malala Yousafzai was shot in the head by a Taliban gunman.

An Afghan carpet seller holds up a framed carpet in his store depicting Hamid Karzai in Kabul, Afghanistan, March 30, 2014.