Danish Siddiqui, the Pulitzer Prize winning Reuters Chief Photographer was killed while covering clashes between Afghan forces and the Taliban in Kandahar. Siddiqui was 38 years old.
Reuters has confirmed the news stating that Siddiqui and a senior Afghan officer were killed during a firefight against Taliban forces in a market area in Spin Boldak.
Siddiqui had been covering the ongoing clash between Afghanistan and the Taliban over the Afghanistan-Pakistan border crossing in Spin Boldak.
In a Twitter thread on July 13, Siddiqui had documented the clash in Kandahar in a series of videos and photos.
Quoting an Afghan commander, Reuters state that Siddiqui was speaking with shopkeepers in the area when the Taliban attacked again.
According to their statement, Siddiqui had informed Reuters that he suffered a shrapnel injury in his arm on Friday and received treatment for it after the Taliban withdrew from the area.
Siddiqui graduated with a Masters in Mass Communication from Jamia Millia Islamia University. He worked as a news correspondent with a news channel before switching over to photojournalism.
He had worked at Reuters as a photojournalist since joining the organisation as an intern in 2010.
During his time at Reuters, Siddiqui covered the 2015 earthquake in Nepal, the battle for Mosul between Iraqi forces and Islamic State terrorists, the Rohingya refugee crisis, the 2019 Easter bombings in Sri Lanka, the 2020 Delhi Riots, the protests against the Citizenship Ammendment Act, protests in Hong Kong and the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic in India.
Siddiqui, along with six other Reuters photographers, won the coveted Pulitzer Prize for Feature Photography in 2018 for their series documenting the Rohingya Refugee Crisis.
Journalists, in India and abroad, paid tribute to Siddiqui on social media.