The Siege of Kobane

• Prize
• Photographer
  Ismail Ferdous , Bangladesh
• Studio
  Ismail Ferdous

The Siege of Kobane was hurled by the Islamic State (also known
as ISIL or ISIS) fighters on 16 September 2014, in order to capture
the town of Kobane in northern Syria. By the first quarter of
October 2014, ISIS was achieved in capturing more than 350
Kurdish villages and towns within the locality of Kobane making a
flood of some 300,000 displaced Kurdish, most of who escaped
across the border into Turkey.

At the Turkish-Syrian border hundreds thousands of refugees
were waiting to figure out where they can find a safe shelter. There
were hundreds of cars and buses jam-packed with people,
predominantly women and children, who had fled Kobane and
traveled north. Some have carried livestock with them in the hope
that they can soon return to the farmlands they quickly evacuated,
an increasingly lonely desire. People who had crossed here were
anxious about their families who were stuck on that small strip of
land between Kobane and Turkish border. There were constant
bombing, a trail of smoke at the sky.

I saw men, women and children carrying or dragging everything
they could manage. Even a lot of people were carrying their doves
in a big sack and also cages of their pet birds. Pregnant women
were carrying suitcases. In some cases, children were pulling bags
almost as big as themselves. Dust was everywhere, and a feel of
misery was tangible in the air. Many sleeps inside family cars
parked next to the barb wire border fence and many of these
people had spent the past nights sleeping in open fields before
they could cross the border.

• Awards
  2014 – National Press Photographers Association- Best of Photojournalism Award 2014 2013 – Eddie Adams Photojournalism Workshop Scholarship, USA. 2013 – Grand Prize in InterAction 13th photo contest 2013, USA. 2013 - 3rd Prize “Celebrating Life” photo contest. 2012 - 1st Prize in ForeStClim photo contest 2012, Germany. 2012 – 1st Place, Gold Award in in the 2012 Commonwealth Photographic Awards, UK. 2012 - Award of Excellence for the Alexia Foundation Grant 2012, USA. 2012 - 2nd Prize in IRHA's “Raindrops Geneva Award”, Switzerland. 2012 - 2nd prize in People and Planet Award, Australia. 2012 – Selected artist for Sivershotz Folio 2012- book and exhibition. 2012 - Winner Artist of World Bank Imagining Our Future Together. 2012 - 2nd Prize in WHO-World AIDS Day 2011 2012 - 1st and 3rd prize in 10:10 photo contest on Climate Change and Urban Jungle. 2011 - 2012 Selected as Young photographer for The Kiyosato Museum of Photographic Arts, Japan 2011 - Save Water Australia finalist award,.