Shooting gallery

Friday, February 8, 2008

Stephen Dupont, 40, is a Sydney-based freelancer who has spent 16 years covering conflicts in places like Angola, Sri Lanka and Afghanistan.

"My first venture into an active war zone was in Sri Lanka in 1991. I was travelling in the north of the country, having followed a trail of refugees moving from the government side back to the Tamil side. I ended up coming across a group of government soldiers. As I approached them, the [Tamil] Tigers opened up directly at me with automatic weapons. I could literally feel the wind of the bullets passing by. It was a completely surreal and numbing experience. I just stood there as the bullets were whizzing past me.

Ben Bohane, 38, is a Sydney-born freelance photojournalist based in Vanuatu. For the past 20 years he’s plied his trade in trouble spots from Afghanistan, Northern Ireland, New Guinea and East Timor.

"I started out in 1989 covering the Vietnamese troop withdrawal from Cambodia. I got the bug and didn’t leave.

There have been a few close calls over the years. I got blown off my feet in Afghanistan in ’92 when a rocket slammed into an apartment block. I was staying in this hotel in downtown Kabul for $6 a night – including food. All the other rooms were taken up by Mujahideen. Unbeknown to me, we were directly opposite the fighting going on in south Kabul. The Mujahideen, once they’d taken control, had immediately split into three or four different factions and were fighting among themselves for control of the city. One of the warlords was firing rockets into Kabul at various times of the day. I went out to get some fresh air and buy a few things, and this rocket hit probably 100m away from where I was. Just the force of it blew me off my feet.

Do you think these war photographer should arm themselves with a gun for protection? Leave your comment below.