Russians Scoop World Photo Prizes

Three Russians are among the winning photographers to be exhibited in this years World Press Photo of the Year ExhibitionClick here, currently on show at the city's Red October Gallery until 27 July.

Yury Kozyrev scooped top prize in the portraiture section for his composition of an Iraqi mother and son in their homeland; Alexander Taran bagged second prize in the Sports Action nomination for a photo essay of a sambo fighting tournament in St. Petersburg, and Alexei Bushov came away in third place for a stunning shot of a leopard hunt in Nambia in the Nature category.

The exhibition is renown as the cream of the crop of photographs taken over 12 months and aims to present a visual display of the worlds main events from war-torn conflict and its effects on its victims, often human, sometimes wildlife, increasingly environmental to the more mundane, although never the less fascinating. As the judges consider the photographs, not just on their artistic merit but also their relevance to newsworthiness, this years selection sees images that capture the fall-out of the global recession.

Among them is a black and white shot of an American Sheriff in someone's home after an eviction. The jury chair, MaryAnne Golon, said: "It looks like a classic conflict photograph, but it is simply the eviction of people from a house following foreclosure.

Nearly 100,000 photographs were submitted to the international jury by photographers, agencies and media outlets from all over the world. The juries whittled these down to just 196 shots taken within 27 countries by 62 photographers.

Last years conflict between Russia and Georgia over South Ossetia also features including a photo essay by Ukrainian Gleb Granich, who caused controversy, when he was accused of staging some of his shots although the claims were unsubstantiated.

Muscovites have been flocking to the exhibition in recent years, hungry to see the evocative images of world strife and conflict; last year 25,000 visited the show.

The World Press Photo of the Year 2008 is on until July 27, at Krasny Oktyabr (Red October) former chocolate factory Karamelny Tsekh (store 4), 6 Bersenevskaya Nab., bldg. 3, m. Kropotkinskaya, Moscow