Bassam Khabieh

Bassam Khabieh is an award-winning freelance photographer who lives in Syria and works for the Reuters News Agency. When the Syrian uprising began in 2011, Bassam bravely took to the streets and using the camera in his mobile phone he recorded the precarious and life-changing developments taking place around him.

In August 2013, events took a dramatic and devastating turn for the Syrian people with the chemical attacks in Eastern Ghouta. Now owning a DSLR camera, Bassam set off to photograph the devastating after-effects. He said: 'I woke up that morning and after hearing about the chemical attack I headed towards the medical points where I knew the injured would be taken. On the way I saw many dead and injured people. I saw a little baby among them. When I approached her there was no blood or injuries, she looked like she was sleeping among the dead.

It was a horrible moment entering deserted neighbourhoods where many residents had been killed by chemical weapons. I saw cats and dogs too lying on the ground, and dead sheep in the fields of a farm. A field hospital in Douma left a huge impact on me that I will never forget. I saw many people with lost limbs and eyes, children and women among them. Afterwards, the loud cries of pain from the wounded that survived rang in my ears at night.'

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Bassam Khabieh