Guardian: Φωτογράφος του 2015 ο Γιάννης Μπεχράκης

Guardian photographer of the year 2015: Yannis Behrakis

This year the Guardian picture desk has chosen Yannis Behrakis of Reuters as our agency photographer of the year. Here are the most astonishing moments he captured in two of the biggest stories of 2015 – the refugee crisis and the financial implosion in his home country Greece

The refugee crisis


I have been covering refugees and migrants for over 25 years, but this year has been different: migrants are arriving in my homeland. A couple of boats came every night. Everybody aboard was scared because they didn’t know how the police and locals would react. Small dinghies kept on coming, even when the weather was rough. The Turkish coast is just 4-5 km away

A Syrian refugee mother carries her child off a dinghy on the Greek island of Lesbos, after crossing the Aegean sea from Turkey
Kos

Refugees carry their children off a dinghy on to a beach on the Greek island of Kos after crossing from Turkey. The vast majority of those arriving are Syrians 



Last year, I was in Suruc on the Turkish-Syrian border documenting the thousands of Kurdish refugees fleeing the town of Kobani. This year on Lesbos, a man I met in Suruc recognised me. 'I made it, man! I made it,' he said


Yannis Behrakis

A Syrian refugee child covered by a thermal blanket in the port of Kos following a rescue mission in August

A crowded dinghy approaches Kos  

 Syrian men form a safety passage for women after a clash during a registration procedure in the national stadium


A tourist walks past an Iranian migrant collapsing next to his son and wife moments after arriving in an engineless dinghy



The least challenging part of this year was taking pictures. The biggest struggle was the emotional involvement ... it was so sad to see the same thing again and again

Yannis Behrakis

 It was very quiet on the island before tourist season started. I waited for two or three boats a night. I could hear the engines from the beach. In the mornings I went to the abandoned Captain Elias hotel, where most of the migrants and refugees were put up, to take more pictures

Lesbos

I started working at 6:30am and finished at 11pm or midnight. Boats kept coming through the night. Around noon they stopped for a few hours, because the sun was so strong. I would stop at 2pm, file some pictures then start again at 4pm


A Syrian refugee holds his children as he struggles to leave a dinghy on Lesbos

One day I was photographing a raft when I noticed movement in the water. I thought someone had jumped overboard. I focused using a long lens – then saw a fin. A dolphin jumped almost in front of the raft. It was a truly magical moment. It was as if the dolphin was showing the way and welcoming the people 

Yannis Behrakis

 A local man helps a Syrian refugee as he swims to land, exhausted

A volunteer signals to a dinghy of Afghan migrants in Lesbos

Afghan family members embrace each other upon arrival

 A refugee keeps warm by an open fire at a makeshift camp on Lesbos, 18 November
Idomeni

Idomeni

A Syrian refugee kisses his daughter as he walks through a rainstorm towards Greece's border with Macedonia, in September. The village of Idomeni has been a key point on the Balkan route from Greece to the Schengen region of Europe. In November, large numbers of refugees were left stranded when Macedonian authorities began to turn away migrants not fleeing war in Syria, Iraq or Afghanistan

No one expected there to be so many of them. But most Greeks have some refugee blood, and locals realised these people only wanted to use Greece as a stepping stone to go north

Yannis Behrakis

Refugees and Macedonian police clash after a migrant was electrocuted and badly burned when he climbed on top of a train wagon, 28 November

A refugee girl cries after passing through a police cordon before crossing the Greek-Macedonian border near Idomeni, 4 December

Stranded Iranian migrants who are on hunger strike, some with their lips sewn together, sit on rail tracks at the border with Macedonia near Idomeni

Iranian migrant Hamid, 34, an electrical engineer from Sanandij, sits on the tracks in front of Macedonian riot police guarding the borderline with Greece, on 23 November. Hamid and a dozen other Iranian migrants were on hunger strike for a second day


I want to express my gratitude to all the Greek and foreign volunteers who helped in the islands and the northern border. You prove that humanity is alive!


Yannis Behrakis

Migrants and refugees beg special riot policemen of FYRO Macedonia to allow passage from Greece into FYRO Macedonia during a rainstorm


The experience

The emotional impact of covering the refugee crisis is devastating. I have suffered from insomnia and nightmares, and felt guilty many times for not being able to do more. I have refugee blood myself – and I am a father


Yannis Behrakis

Amoun, 70, a Palestinian refugee who lived in Aleppo in Syria, rests on a beach after arriving from Turkey on a dinghy with 40 others

I was on a beach in Kos waiting for the rafts to arrive ... then I saw an older lady on the beach with the flicker of a smile on her face. She looked very calm and comfortable. I stayed a few metres away and shot some frames as the morning sun illuminated her face. I decided to approach and offer her a small sweet – a gesture of Greek hospitality. I kneeled before her and held out the sweet, saying good morning in Arabic. She seemed lost, but her gentle face still had a beautiful smile. She reached upwards with her hand and then I realised she was blind. I was overwhelmed by emotion. We exchanged some pleasantries in English and Arabic then she took the sweet, gave me a warm handshake with both hands and thanked me. Her family was watching, some smiling, some with tears of joy running down their faces. This was one of my best mornings of the year


Financial drama

A man talks on the phone in his office at Greece's Ministry of Foreign Affairs as the Greek parliament is reflected on the building in Athens in March. Greece had promised its lenders to reform its state sector and implement labour reforms to make its economy more competitive, improve its tax administration and fight tax evasion and corruption, which were widely blamed for the debt crisis

Prime minister Alexis Tsipras, elected on a promise to end six years of austerity, implores a packed Syntagma square to spurn the tough aid deal from international creditors

Pro-Euro protestors wave flags during a rally at the parliament building in Athens

A pedestrian walks through empty streets by a mural in Athens in July

Riot policemen stand between anti-austerity and pro-EU protesters in front of the parliament building during a rally calling on the government to clinch a deal with its international creditors



It’s very hard working on a big story in your home country ... the emotional pressure is enormous when you see your friends and family suffer


Yannis Behrakis

Debt crisis

I have been covering Greece’s financial crisis non-stop since 2010. In my 28-year career as a Reuters photojournalist the idea of covering a catastrophe in my own country had always been a nightmare in my mind. I did my best to stay impartial while covering a financial and political crisis that seemed unthinkable until this year

A pensioner leans against the door of the National Bank in Athens in July

A man walks by graffitti in the Greek capital in July

Riot police stand among flames from exploded petrol bombs thrown by a small group of anti-establishment demonstrators in front of parliament in Athens in July



Day by day, month by month, year by year, the situation got worse. At the start of 2015 it became clear that Greece was entering the most difficult part of the crisis. We had two national elections, a referendum, capital controls imposed and unemployment remained the highest in the EU


Yannis Behrakis

Alexis Tsipras shares a joke with Parliament Speaker Zoe Konstantopoulou before a ruling Syriza party parliamentary group session in Athens in July, as Tsipras battled to win lawmakers' approval for a bailout deal to keep Greece in the Euro



Forest fires

Locals watch a firefighting plane drop water over a fire near holiday homes in the village of Costa in southeastern Greece during a developing wildfire in July. Dozens were evacuated as firefighters fought the blaze

A Greek Orthodox priest covers his nose and mouth as he walks away from a forest fire near Saint George church in an Athens neighborhood
Ghost factories

Deserted grain silos are seen in front of the snowcapped Mount Olympus near the town of Larissa in Thessaly. A 2,500km trip from Athens to northeastern Greece and back shows the remnants of a once-flourishing Greek industry, which has seen a 30% drop in production. Abandoned factories are often looted, adding to the scenes of desolation

A deserted factory that closed in the early 1990s in the Sindos industrial zone of the town of Thessaloniki in central Macedonia region, April

A flag is draped over the gate of a deserted cooking oil factory that closed in 1996 in the town of Elefsina in Sterea Hellas

A punch clock in the entrance of the factory

Photography can leave people speechless with its power and beauty. It can send a message to the audience, make people cry or laugh or both. It can make people feel guilty – or give money for a good cause. And it can make people think twice before pulling the trigger ...

Yannis Behrakis

Monday 21 December 2015
http://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/ng-interactive/2015/dec/21/photographer-of-the-year-2015-yannis-behrakis