A photographer has reacted with fury after an image he took in Calais was used in an article questioning the status of newly arrived child refugees.
A photographer has reacted with fury after an image he took in Calais was used in an article questioning the status of newly arrived child refugees.
On Tuesday, 14 child refugees were reunited with their families in the UK from the Calais refugee and migrant camp, known as the “Jungle”.
Among the widespread coverage was this composite photograph from The Telegraph website, which began doing the rounds on Twitter.
The man who took the central image above, photographer Bjorn Kietzmann, said he was shocked at how his image had been used.
“I despise how one of my journalistic photos [was] misused,” the freelance photographer told BuzzFeed News. Kietzmann went on to say that not only was it very unprofessional, it was also awful because “a Sudanese refugee who is stuck for four months in Calais is presented as [a] fraudster”.
In a Facebook post, he said he had spent several days in the Calais “Jungle” refugee camp earlier this week and that the photograph was part of a number he took of migrants and refugees in the camp.
He confirmed that the photograph used by the The Telegraph was taken on 17 October in the Calais camp, not Croydon. “It shows a Sudanese refugee wearing a ‘I love London’ – shirt who is stuck in Calais since 4 months,” he wrote. “I do not know how old he is, but he has towards me never claimed to be a child.”
Kietzmann added that he did not think – although he could not be sure – that the individual was among those 14 originally taken to Croydon. He said it was “shocking” to see “how my material was taken out of context”.
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