Global News Journal

from Photographers Blog:

A tribute to journalist and colleague Sabah al-Bazee

Reuters correspondent Peter Graff in Baghdad writes following the death of journalist Sabah al-Bazee:

For those of us who work in the Baghdad bureau, it is always a shock to look back through the collected photos of one of our Iraqi colleagues. We think we are used to those old scenes. But seen one after another, the images compiled over eight years of carnage by a single journalist like Sabah al-Bazee still have the power to freeze your blood.

There’s a photo that Sabah took showing the bodies of a family killed during a botched U.S. military raid on their home in 2005. Three small children wrapped in blankets, who look almost like they are sleeping, snuggled with their parents, their faces pale and lifeless in the dust.

The first word that colleagues around our office were using on Tuesday to describe Sabah, who died in an attack in his home town of Tikrit, was “enthusiastic”. The second, heard from several and meant as a sincere compliment, was “almost childlike”.