The Protester: A Portfolio by Peter Hapak

Ahmed Harara is a dentist. While protesting during the Egyptian revolution in January, Harara was struck in the eye by a rubber bullet. Blinded in one eye, he continued protesting. Then during the most recent protests in Tahrir Square, Ahmed was shot in his other eye by a rubber bullet. Now he is completely blind.

But he kept protesting.

Ahmad is one of more than a hundred protestors around the world photographed by TIME contract photographer Peter Hapak. From Oakland to New York, and across Europe and through the Middle East, Hapak and I traveled nearly 25,000 miles and photographed protesters and activists from eight countries.

We photographed protesters representing Occupy Wall Street, Occupy Oakland, Occupy the Hood, the Indignados of Spain, protesters in Greece, revolutionaries in Tunisia and Egypt, activists from Syria fleeing persecution, a crusader fighting corruption in India, Tea Party activists from New York, a renowned poet-turned-protestor from Mexico, and a protestor from Wisconsin who carries a shovel, topped by a flag.

We set up makeshift studios in hotel rooms, inside apartments and peoples homes, inside a temple in rural India, an anarchist headquarters in Athens, even in the courtyard of the home of Mannoubia Bouazizi, the mother of Tunisian street vendor Mohamed Bouazizi. Tear gas wafted into our makeshift studio inside a hotel room overlooking Tahrir Square—the same room Yuri Kozyrev made the now-iconic photograph of the crowd.

Each time we asked subjects to bring with them mementos of protest. Rami Jarrah, a Syrian activist who had fled to Cairo, brought his battered iPhone. He showed me some of the most intense protest footage I’ve ever seen on that broken screen. A Spanish protester named Stephane Grueso brought his iPhone also, referring to it as a “weapon.” Some young Egyptian protesters brought rubber pellets that had been fired at them by security forces. Another brought a spent tear gas canister. Some carried signs, flags, gas masks (some industrial ones, some homemade, like Egyptian graffiti artist El Teneen—his was made from a Pepsi can). A trio of Greek protesters brought Maalox. Mixed with water, sprayed on their eyes to counter the harsh effects of tear gas. Molly Catchpole, the young woman from Washington, D.C. who took on Bank of America – and won – brought her chopped up debit card. Sayda al-Manahe brought a framed photograph of her son, Hilme, a young Tunisian man killed by police during the revolution. El General, the Tunisian revolutionary rapper, brought nothing but his voice – he rapped a capella for us (we have a video). Lina Ben Mhenni, a blogger from Tunisia and Nobel Peace Prize contender, brought her laptop. She was speaking Arabic yet we understood the words “Facebook” and “Twitter.”

Each subject was photographed in front of a white or black background – eliminating their environments but elevating their commonality to that of “Protester,” a fitting set up for a group of people united by a common desire for change.

“They were all unhappy, they wanted change and they wanted better life,” Hapak said. “Everybody is out there to unite their power for one common cause, one common expression—to get a better life”

Patrick Witty is the International Picture Editor at TIME.

Peter Hapak is a contract photographer for TIME, who most recently photographed Tilda Swinton in the December 19, 2011 issue.

MORE: See the entire 2011 Person of the Year package here

Egypt’s “Second” Revolution: Photographs by Yuri Kozyrev

On November 19, thousands of Egyptians took to Tahrir Square once
again in what many called a “second” revolution—or even the “real”
revolution. Within a week, the protest had spread to cities across
Egypt, and the iconic square in downtown Cairo had again become a
space of war and protest, as protesters this time called for the end
of military rule, and a final toppling of the junta that ousted
President Hosni Mubarak left behind. Days of clashes between
protesters and Egyptian central security forces left more than 40
people dead and nearly 2,000 wounded, and let activists and analysts
to draw comparisons to Tahrir’s earlier days of fame, when thousands
of Egyptians occupied the square last winter to demand the end of
Mubarak’s rule.

This latest unraveling came as authorities tried to clear the square
in downtown Cairo following a mass protest on Friday. Islamists and
young liberals had gathered to protest a proposed set of
“supraconstitutional” principles that would place the military largely
outside the realm of judicial and parliamentary supervision, as well
as giving the institution wide veto power over the development of the
next government and constitution. But the ensuing clashes only drove
more protesters into the square.

Just days ahead of parliamentary elections on Nov. 28, the occupation of the
square became a lynchpin of debate between Egyptian politicians,
generals, activists and regular citizens on the best way forward for
a nation in turmoil. Ultimately, the junta succeeded in holding the
election—a boost to their credibility as interim rulers—even as some
continued to protest.

Voter turnout far surpassed that of previous sham elections, held
under Mubarak, and lines at polling stations snaked around city blocks
as men and women from across the political and economic spectrum
waited to cast their votes.

Monday’s parliamentary election — the first relatively free,
democratic race in Egypt’s history, and perhaps the biggest bellwether
of a long and turbulent Arab Spring — rang in harsh truths for some, a
tide of satisfaction and new hopes for others. For the majority of
Egyptians, eager to elect a new government that they hope will lift
the country out of post-revolution turmoil, the vote was a tremendous
success. For the liberals, youth, and others who had hoped to usher in
bigger changes through Tahrir Square, the vote signaled that a second
revolution is yet to come.

Abigail Hauslohner is TIME’s Cairo correspondent. Find her on Twitter @ahauslohner.

Yuri Kozyrev is a contract photographer for TIME who has covered the Arab Spring since January.

Via: http://lightbox.time.com

Following a nuclear train

126 hours from La Hague to Gorleben; the longest ever nuclear waste transport from Germany to France

This is a retrospective on the past 10 years, during which I have covered the nuclear waste transportation from France to Germany many times. The German nuclear waste from power plants is transported in Castor (Cask for Storage and Transport of Radioactive material) containers by train to the northern German interim storage facility of Gorleben.

As the train came closer to its final destination, I would end up with only a few hours sleep, mile-long marches on foot through forests and fields and never-ending police checkpoints. But in the end each castor transport reached its intended destination.

Nuclear waste from German nuclear power plants was reprocessed at the French plant at La Hague. The train used to transport it was protected in Germany by up to 20,000 policemen. Each transportation was different, but the pictures each year were very similar. There were blockades on the railway tracks, activists chaining themselves to the tracks, peaceful and violent protests along the route and the waiting patiently for hours for the train to move further along.

But this year the protest was very violent. Thousands of activists blocked the transport route between Danneberg and Gorleben and they were displaced by police using water cannons. Local farmers constructed a concrete pyramid, which stood on the tracks. Four of them chained themselves together with a sophisticated mechanism. Specialist police tried for hours to open the mechanism and to clear the railway tracks but after more than 10 hours they gave up. The activists had won.

Ten years ago I took a very special picture, which I will never forget. An anti-nuclear activist managed to climb one of the castor containers forcing the train to stop for a while before he was removed by the police.

Nowhere in the world are anti-nuclear protest so symbolic and visible as in Gorleben. But in the end even in this agricultural region the last castor container still reached its final destination after 126 hours and 1200 kilometers (745 miles).