Documenting courage – Stephen Ferry and Human Rights Watch

Photographer Stephen Ferry has spent the best part of a decade documenting the brutal Colombian civil war. Its population is terrrorised by both the left-wing guerillas and the right-wing paramilitary groups (who are often linked to the government and police) and their shadowy successors. The conflict is not only ideological – the lucrative drug business also plays a role.

Human Rights Watch has now published this multimedia piece on Ferry’s work, telling the stories of three remarkable individuals – a lawyer, a doctor and a journalist – who continue to live their lives in the face of deadly and constant threats.

These groups know how to threaten Colombians – they use intimate languauge, telling them what time their daughter leaves school, what supermarket they just visited or what clothes their husband wore the previous day. People receive bullets through the post and copies of their own obituary, along with descriptions of what they’ll look like when they die.

Thanks to ever brilliant Stan Banos of Reciprocity Failure fame for the find.