The Siege of Mariupol by Evgeniy Maloletka is the photo that won World Press Photo of the Year, the main award of the 66th edition of World Press Photo. A pregnant woman is the focus of last year’s best single photo, suffering on a makeshift stretcher carried by rescuers from the explosions at the Mariupol hospital that was bombed on March 9, 2022. The image is one of the strongest and one of the images captured by reporters during the bombing war in Ukraine and was widely circulated after the Russian attack on the facility. The woman is 32-year-old Iryna Kalinina who, after being discharged from Mariupol Children’s Hospital, had to undergo a caesarean section to try to save the stillborn baby. A little later Kalinina also died. There were many theories put forward by Kremlin propaganda that Kalinina and other women injured in the attack were actually actresses, but as Open has shown, these theories were unfounded.
Prizes were also awarded in the other categories of the competition. World Press Photo Story of the Year, which crowned Best Photographic Story, won by Mads Nissen, with work The Price of Peace in Afghanistan; the World Press Photo Long-Term Project Award for Best Long-Term Project, won by Anush Babajanyan with Battered Waters; and the World Press Photo Open Format Award for Best “Free” Project, presented to Mohamed Mahdy, author of Here, The Doors Don’t Know Me.