These are the best press photos in the world 2022

On the occasion of the “World Press Photo Contest 2023” in Amsterdam, the best photos from the press and from last year were chosen. From April 22, the photos can be seen in a museum in the Dutch capital. The annual exhibition presents the results of the photo competition and showcases the best and most important photojournalists and documentary photographers of the past year. They were selected by an independent jury.

Here are the winners and their stories in the top three categories:

picture of the year

Associated Press photographer Evgeniy Maloletka wins the World Press Photo of the Year award for this March 9, 2022 photo from Ukraine, showing the chaotic aftermath of the Russian attack on the maternity hospital in the Ukrainian city of Mariupol.

story of the year

The photographer Mads Nissen received the prize in the category “Story of the Year” for his series “The Price of Peace” (“Der Preis des Friedens”) from a total of nine photographs from Afghanistan. Here are three of those images and their stories.

Unable to afford food for the family, 15-year-old Khalil Ahmad’s parents decided to sell his kidney for $3,500. The lack of jobs and the threat of famine has led to a dramatic increase in the illegal organ trade. Herat, Afghanistan, January 19, 2022.

Women and children beg for bread outside a bakery in central Kabul, Afghanistan, January 14, 2022.

This photo shows the Islamic creed “There is no god but Allah, and Muhammad is his messenger” adorning the wall of the former US embassy in Kabul, Afghanistan.

Project price for the long term

Photographer Anush Babajanyan was honored for her years of work on a subject “rarely reported outside of Central Asia”. It shows the effects of water management after the end of the Soviet Union, which were exacerbated by the climate crisis.

Women visit a hot spring created from the dry bed of the Aral Sea near the village of Akespe in Kazakhstan August 27, 2019. The Aral Sea, once the fourth largest lake in the world, has lost 90 percent of its content since river water was diverted .

(lacquer)