Founded in 2011, Pictures of the Year Latin America, or POY Latam, is a biennial documentary and artistic photography contest in Ibero-America. It was created with the support of the Missouri School of Journalism Pictures of the Year International (POY), a program of the Donald W. Reynolds Journalism Institute.
This year, Associated Press photographer Rodrigo Abd was named the POY Latam 2025 Photojournalist of the Year. Abd has spent years documenting social struggles and upheavals across Latin America.
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FILE PHOTO GALLERY - Pigeons take flight near the Shah-Do Shamshira Mosque in Kabul, Afghanistan, June 8, 2023. (AP Photo/Rodrigo Abd)
FILE PHOTO GALLERY - Nikbakht, 70, works in a carpet factory in Kabul, Afghanistan, May 29, 2023. (AP Photo/Rodrigo Abd, File)
FILE PHOTO GALLERY - Seasonal brick worker Ibrahim poses for a portrait with his children, from left to right, Arzo,10; Okhkulah, 9; Rana, 8; and Abobaker, 7, while taking a break from working in a brick factory on the outskirts of Kabul, Afghanistan, May 30, 2023. (AP Photo/Rodrigo Abd, File)
FILE PHOTO GALLERY - Children play on swings near the Kart-e Sakhy cemetery in Kabul, Afghanistan, June 8, 2023. (AP Photo/Rodrigo Abd, File)
FILE PHOTO GALLERY - Hakimeh, 55, and her daughter Fereshte, 17, pose for a portrait in a carpet factory where they work in Kabul, Afghanistan, May 29, 2023. (AP Photo/Rodrigo Abd, File)
FILE PHOTO GALLERY - A passenger's hat rests on a seat of the Maya Train en route to Valladolid, Mexico, March 6, 2024. When it's completed, the high-speed Maya Train will wind around Mexico's southern Yucatan peninsula. (AP Photo/Rodrigo Abd)
FILE PHOTO GALLERY - A passenger looks at the passing jungle landscape while traveling on the Maya Train from Cancun to Valladolid, Mexico, March 6, 2024. (AP Photo/Rodrigo Abd)
FILE PHOTO GALLERY - Biologist Roberto Rojo, left, observes stalactites near a steel pillar filled with concrete that was installed inside the Aktun Tuyul cave system to support the Maya Train track, on the outskirts of Playa del Carmen, Mexico, March 8, 2024. (AP Photo/Rodrigo Abd)
FILE PHOTO GALLERY - This hole was cut into the Aktun Tuyul cave system, made by massive metal drills to introduce a steel pillar filled with concrete that will be used to support a part of the Maya Train track, on the outskirts of Playa del Carmen, Mexico, March 1, 2024. (AP Photo/Rodrigo Abd)
FILE PHOTO GALLERY - A fish swims past a web of aquatic plants inside a cenote in Rancho Viejo, Mexico, March 1, 2024. These glowing sinkhole lakes, known as cenotes, are a part of one of Mexico's natural wonders: A fragile system of thousands of subterranean caverns, rivers, and lakes that wind beneath Mexico's southern Yucatan peninsula. (AP Photo/Rodrigo Abd)
FILE PHOTO GALLERY - Tourists don decorative body paint at a bar on the edge of a cenote in Tulum, Mexico, March 2, 2024. Construction of the Maya Train is rapidly destroying part of the hidden underground world of caverns and sinkhole lakes, known as cenotes, already under threat by development and mass tourism. (AP Photo/Rodrigo Abd)
FILE PHOTO GALLERY - Uprooted trees serving as decor are suspended over the entrance of a tourist complex in Playa del Carmen, Mexico, March 7, 2024. Once a Mayan settlement, the city is among many in the Yucatan Peninsula that in recent decades have been converted into a party hub for vacationing foreigners. (AP Photo/Rodrigo Abd)
FILE PHOTO GALLERY - Magali Vargas strikes a pose while cleaning the floor of the pavilion reserved for transgender inmates at the Regional Penitentiary in Coronel Oviedo, Paraguay, Aug. 30, 2024. (AP Photo/Rodrigo Abd)
FILE PHOTO GALLERY - An inmate giggles as a volunteer physical therapist provides a free stretching session during visitors day at the Regional Penitentiary in Villarica, Paraguay, Sept. 1, 2024. (AP Photo/Rodrigo Abd)
FILE PHOTO GALLERY - Inmates reach out from their cell to receive bread at lunchtime at the Juan de la Vega prison in Emboscada, Paraguay, July 12, 2024. (AP Photo/Rodrigo Abd)
FILE PHOTO GALLERY - Inmates line up for a jail-provided meal known as "vori-vori" at the Tacumbu prison in Asuncion, Paraguay, July 10, 2024. (AP Photo/Rodrigo Abd)
FILE PHOTO GALLERY - Prisoners eat a jail-provided soup known as "vori vori" at the Tacumbu prison in Asuncion, Paraguay, July 8, 2024. The soup, made of chicken or beef, vegetables, and corn balls stuffed with cheese, is considered the food of the poorest inmates. (AP Photo/Rodrigo Abd)
FILE PHOTO GALLERY - A urinal is located along an observation walkway for security guards at the Tacumbu prison in Asuncion, Paraguay, July 8, 2024. (AP Photo/Rodrigo Abd)
FILE PHOTO GALLERY - Prisoners peer out from their group cell in the late afternoon as another prisoner prepares to enter another group cell at the Regional Penitentiary in Villarica, Paraguay, Aug. 31, 2024. (AP Photo/Rodrigo Abd)
FILE PHOTO GALLERY - A prison security guard shows the knife he keeps on his person as he patrols outside the Regional Penitentiary in Villarica, Paraguay, Aug. 31, 2024. (AP Photo/Rodrigo Abd)
FILE PHOTO GALLERY - Inmates mill about a courtyard of the Tacumbu prison in Asuncion, Paraguay, July 9, 2024. (AP Photo/Rodrigo Abd)
FILE PHOTO GALLERY - Inmates smoking crack, who are referred to as "Cambodians", are housed in one of the poorest sections of the Tacumbu prison known as the pavilion, in Asuncion, Paraguay, July 8, 2024. (AP Photo/Rodrigo Abd)
FILE PHOTO GALLERY - A girl runs past as border police agents patrol Los Pumitas neighborhood, where an 11-year-old boy was killed days earlier when at least one gunmen attacked a birthday party, amid escalating drug violence in Rosario, Argentina, March 9, 2023. (AP Photo/Rodrigo Abd)
FILE PHOTO GALLERY - A chair sits inside inside a house that residents say is an alleged drugs sales point known as the “Bunker” which was destroyed by neighbors and relatives of an 11-year-old boy who was fatally shot when at least one gunmen attacked a birthday party in Los Pumitas neighborhood of Rosario, Argentina, March 7, 2023. (AP Photo/Rodrigo Abd)
FILE PHOTO GALLERY - Neighbors shout for help while assisting Veronica Lopez, aunt of Máximo Jerez, an 11-year-old boy was killed when a gunman attacked a birthday in the Los Pumitas neighborhood of Rosario, Argentina, March 6, 2023. Lopez fainted during violence that erupted after the death of the boy. (AP Photo/Rodrigo Abd)
FILE PHOTO GALLERY - A woman makes off with several bags of flour as she exits the home of a suspected drug dealer, after his home was set on fire by neighbors and relatives of an 11-year-old boy who was killed during a birthday party, in Los Pumitas neighborhood of Rosario, Argentina, March 6, 2023. (AP Photo/Rodrigo Abd)
FILE PHOTO GALLERY - An aerial view of Los Pumitas neighborhood, where an 11-year-old boy was fatally shot at a birthday party in Rosario, Argentina, March 7, 2023. Three other children, including a 2-year-old, were injured during the attack. (AP Photo/Rodrigo Abd)
FILE PHOTO GALLERY - Neighbors and relatives of an 11-year-old boy who was fatally shot during a birthday party, destroy the home of the suspected gunman amid anger over escalating drug violence in Los Pumitas neighborhood of Rosario, Argentina, March 6, 2023. (AP Photo/Rodrigo Abd)
FILE PHOTO GALLERY - Dogs battle it out as a crowd gathers to watch in Los Pumitas neighborhood where an 11-year-old boy was fatally shot during a birthday party that spurred residents to wrecked the home of the suspected gunman and drug dealer, in Rosario, Argentina, March 6, 2023. (AP Photo/Rodrigo Abd)
FILE PHOTO GALLERY - Brine evaporates in pools at the lithium extraction plant facilities of the SQM Lithium company near Peine, Chile, April 18, 2023. In the "lithium triangle" – a region spanning Argentina, Chile and Bolivia – native communities sit upon a treasure trove of the stuff: an estimated trillion dollars in lithium. (AP Photo/Rodrigo Abd)
FILE PHOTO GALLERY - The legs of a dismembered man protrude from a bag on a street where dogs roam in the Colinas de La Florida neighborhood of Guayaquil, Ecuador, Oct. 1, 2023. The legs laid there for hours before being picked up by authorities and the rest of the man's body parts were found scattered a few blocks away. (AP Photo/Rodrigo Abd)
FILE PHOTO GALLERY - Soldiers on patrol force young men into doing squats as punishment for not having the proper documents to circulate their motorcycle, in Duran, Ecuador, Sept. 30, 2023. (AP Photo/Rodrigo Abd)
FILE PHOTO GALLERY - Residents drive on a bridge, part of a federal highway project that extends over the Nanay River, in Iquitos, Peru, May 26, 2024. Construction work is at a standstill as the government conducts a study of the area, but the Ministry of Transportation has already built what is the country's largest bridge, which extends 2.3 kilometers (1.4 miles) over the Nanay, a tributary of the Amazon River. (AP Photo/Rodrigo Abd)
FILE PHOTO GALLERY - A protester’s dentures fly out of his mouth while running for cover as police on motorcycle work to disperse a demonstration of retirees demanding higher pensions, in Buenos Aires, Argentina, March 5, 2025. (AP Photo/Rodrigo Abd)
FILE PHOTO GALLERY - A police car goes up in flames, set on fire during a protest led by soccer fans in support of retirees demanding higher pensions and opposing austerity measures implemented by Javier Milei's government, in Buenos Aires, Argentina, March 12, 2025. (AP Photo/Rodrigo Abd, File)
Abd’s winning portfolio brings together striking individual images, capturing the complexities of life in Latin America and in-depth essays that delve deeper into Paraguay’s overcrowded prisons, the destruction of sacred caves in Mexico’s Yucatán by the Maya Train project, and a widening of the lens on Afghanistan, where he used a kamra-e-faoree, or instant box camera once common on Afghan streets, to create portraits that reveal a new way of seeing daily life under Taliban rule.
The 2023 death of 11-year-old Máximo Jerez in the Argentine city Rosario after a gunman opened fire at a birthday party drew ire from city residents fed up with drug violence. Neighbors responded by looting and destroying the home of a suspected gunman. In turn, the government sent federal security forces. Abd documented the frustration for a city where drug-related killings have become alarmingly routine.
Paraguay, a key drug trafficking hub in South America, is grappling with severe prison overcrowding. Its 18 prisons were built for about 10,000 inmates but now hold more than 17,600. Despite recent government efforts to tackle internal gang control and other issues, overcrowding remains pervasive. Abd documented conditions in five prisons—four for men and one for women—finding cramped facilities in nearly all but the women’s center.
Mexico’s $30 billion Maya Train, the signature project of former Mexican President Andrés Manuel López Obrador, is designed to link tourist hubs in the Yucatán with rural areas and archaeological sites. But the railway also cuts through one of the country’s most fragile natural treasures: an immense network of caves, rivers, and sinkholes known as cenotes. Abd documented both the damage unfolding underground and the natural beauty that continues to draw tourists to the region.
A wooden box cameras known as kamra-e-faoree, was a common sight on Afghan city streets in the last century — a fast and easy way to make portraits, especially for identity documents. Simple, cheap and portable, they endured amid half a century of dramatic changes in this country — from a monarchy to a communist takeover, from foreign invasions to insurgencies — until 21st-century digital technology rendered them obsolete. Abd went back to this tradition of Afghan photography to capture moments of life under the Taliban: officers directing traffic, children swimming in the river, Taliban fighters gathering for lunch and other daily occurrences.
This is a photo gallery curated by AP photo editors.
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FILE PHOTO GALLERY - Pigeons take flight near the Shah-Do Shamshira Mosque in Kabul, Afghanistan, June 8, 2023. (AP Photo/Rodrigo Abd)
FILE PHOTO GALLERY - Nikbakht, 70, works in a carpet factory in Kabul, Afghanistan, May 29, 2023. (AP Photo/Rodrigo Abd, File)
FILE PHOTO GALLERY - Seasonal brick worker Ibrahim poses for a portrait with his children, from left to right, Arzo,10; Okhkulah, 9; Rana, 8; and Abobaker, 7, while taking a break from working in a brick factory on the outskirts of Kabul, Afghanistan, May 30, 2023. (AP Photo/Rodrigo Abd, File)
FILE PHOTO GALLERY - Children play on swings near the Kart-e Sakhy cemetery in Kabul, Afghanistan, June 8, 2023. (AP Photo/Rodrigo Abd, File)
FILE PHOTO GALLERY - Hakimeh, 55, and her daughter Fereshte, 17, pose for a portrait in a carpet factory where they work in Kabul, Afghanistan, May 29, 2023. (AP Photo/Rodrigo Abd, File)
FILE PHOTO GALLERY - A passenger's hat rests on a seat of the Maya Train en route to Valladolid, Mexico, March 6, 2024. When it's completed, the high-speed Maya Train will wind around Mexico's southern Yucatan peninsula. (AP Photo/Rodrigo Abd)
FILE PHOTO GALLERY - A passenger looks at the passing jungle landscape while traveling on the Maya Train from Cancun to Valladolid, Mexico, March 6, 2024. (AP Photo/Rodrigo Abd)
FILE PHOTO GALLERY - Biologist Roberto Rojo, left, observes stalactites near a steel pillar filled with concrete that was installed inside the Aktun Tuyul cave system to support the Maya Train track, on the outskirts of Playa del Carmen, Mexico, March 8, 2024. (AP Photo/Rodrigo Abd)
FILE PHOTO GALLERY - This hole was cut into the Aktun Tuyul cave system, made by massive metal drills to introduce a steel pillar filled with concrete that will be used to support a part of the Maya Train track, on the outskirts of Playa del Carmen, Mexico, March 1, 2024. (AP Photo/Rodrigo Abd)
FILE PHOTO GALLERY - A fish swims past a web of aquatic plants inside a cenote in Rancho Viejo, Mexico, March 1, 2024. These glowing sinkhole lakes, known as cenotes, are a part of one of Mexico's natural wonders: A fragile system of thousands of subterranean caverns, rivers, and lakes that wind beneath Mexico's southern Yucatan peninsula. (AP Photo/Rodrigo Abd)
FILE PHOTO GALLERY - Tourists don decorative body paint at a bar on the edge of a cenote in Tulum, Mexico, March 2, 2024. Construction of the Maya Train is rapidly destroying part of the hidden underground world of caverns and sinkhole lakes, known as cenotes, already under threat by development and mass tourism. (AP Photo/Rodrigo Abd)
FILE PHOTO GALLERY - Uprooted trees serving as decor are suspended over the entrance of a tourist complex in Playa del Carmen, Mexico, March 7, 2024. Once a Mayan settlement, the city is among many in the Yucatan Peninsula that in recent decades have been converted into a party hub for vacationing foreigners. (AP Photo/Rodrigo Abd)
FILE PHOTO GALLERY - Magali Vargas strikes a pose while cleaning the floor of the pavilion reserved for transgender inmates at the Regional Penitentiary in Coronel Oviedo, Paraguay, Aug. 30, 2024. (AP Photo/Rodrigo Abd)
FILE PHOTO GALLERY - An inmate giggles as a volunteer physical therapist provides a free stretching session during visitors day at the Regional Penitentiary in Villarica, Paraguay, Sept. 1, 2024. (AP Photo/Rodrigo Abd)
FILE PHOTO GALLERY - Inmates reach out from their cell to receive bread at lunchtime at the Juan de la Vega prison in Emboscada, Paraguay, July 12, 2024. (AP Photo/Rodrigo Abd)
FILE PHOTO GALLERY - Inmates line up for a jail-provided meal known as "vori-vori" at the Tacumbu prison in Asuncion, Paraguay, July 10, 2024. (AP Photo/Rodrigo Abd)
FILE PHOTO GALLERY - Prisoners eat a jail-provided soup known as "vori vori" at the Tacumbu prison in Asuncion, Paraguay, July 8, 2024. The soup, made of chicken or beef, vegetables, and corn balls stuffed with cheese, is considered the food of the poorest inmates. (AP Photo/Rodrigo Abd)
FILE PHOTO GALLERY - A urinal is located along an observation walkway for security guards at the Tacumbu prison in Asuncion, Paraguay, July 8, 2024. (AP Photo/Rodrigo Abd)
FILE PHOTO GALLERY - Prisoners peer out from their group cell in the late afternoon as another prisoner prepares to enter another group cell at the Regional Penitentiary in Villarica, Paraguay, Aug. 31, 2024. (AP Photo/Rodrigo Abd)
FILE PHOTO GALLERY - A prison security guard shows the knife he keeps on his person as he patrols outside the Regional Penitentiary in Villarica, Paraguay, Aug. 31, 2024. (AP Photo/Rodrigo Abd)
FILE PHOTO GALLERY - Inmates mill about a courtyard of the Tacumbu prison in Asuncion, Paraguay, July 9, 2024. (AP Photo/Rodrigo Abd)
FILE PHOTO GALLERY - Inmates smoking crack, who are referred to as "Cambodians", are housed in one of the poorest sections of the Tacumbu prison known as the pavilion, in Asuncion, Paraguay, July 8, 2024. (AP Photo/Rodrigo Abd)
FILE PHOTO GALLERY - A girl runs past as border police agents patrol Los Pumitas neighborhood, where an 11-year-old boy was killed days earlier when at least one gunmen attacked a birthday party, amid escalating drug violence in Rosario, Argentina, March 9, 2023. (AP Photo/Rodrigo Abd)
FILE PHOTO GALLERY - A chair sits inside inside a house that residents say is an alleged drugs sales point known as the “Bunker” which was destroyed by neighbors and relatives of an 11-year-old boy who was fatally shot when at least one gunmen attacked a birthday party in Los Pumitas neighborhood of Rosario, Argentina, March 7, 2023. (AP Photo/Rodrigo Abd)
FILE PHOTO GALLERY - Neighbors shout for help while assisting Veronica Lopez, aunt of Máximo Jerez, an 11-year-old boy was killed when a gunman attacked a birthday in the Los Pumitas neighborhood of Rosario, Argentina, March 6, 2023. Lopez fainted during violence that erupted after the death of the boy. (AP Photo/Rodrigo Abd)
FILE PHOTO GALLERY - A woman makes off with several bags of flour as she exits the home of a suspected drug dealer, after his home was set on fire by neighbors and relatives of an 11-year-old boy who was killed during a birthday party, in Los Pumitas neighborhood of Rosario, Argentina, March 6, 2023. (AP Photo/Rodrigo Abd)
FILE PHOTO GALLERY - An aerial view of Los Pumitas neighborhood, where an 11-year-old boy was fatally shot at a birthday party in Rosario, Argentina, March 7, 2023. Three other children, including a 2-year-old, were injured during the attack. (AP Photo/Rodrigo Abd)
FILE PHOTO GALLERY - Neighbors and relatives of an 11-year-old boy who was fatally shot during a birthday party, destroy the home of the suspected gunman amid anger over escalating drug violence in Los Pumitas neighborhood of Rosario, Argentina, March 6, 2023. (AP Photo/Rodrigo Abd)
FILE PHOTO GALLERY - Dogs battle it out as a crowd gathers to watch in Los Pumitas neighborhood where an 11-year-old boy was fatally shot during a birthday party that spurred residents to wrecked the home of the suspected gunman and drug dealer, in Rosario, Argentina, March 6, 2023. (AP Photo/Rodrigo Abd)
FILE PHOTO GALLERY - Brine evaporates in pools at the lithium extraction plant facilities of the SQM Lithium company near Peine, Chile, April 18, 2023. In the "lithium triangle" – a region spanning Argentina, Chile and Bolivia – native communities sit upon a treasure trove of the stuff: an estimated trillion dollars in lithium. (AP Photo/Rodrigo Abd)
FILE PHOTO GALLERY - The legs of a dismembered man protrude from a bag on a street where dogs roam in the Colinas de La Florida neighborhood of Guayaquil, Ecuador, Oct. 1, 2023. The legs laid there for hours before being picked up by authorities and the rest of the man's body parts were found scattered a few blocks away. (AP Photo/Rodrigo Abd)
FILE PHOTO GALLERY - Soldiers on patrol force young men into doing squats as punishment for not having the proper documents to circulate their motorcycle, in Duran, Ecuador, Sept. 30, 2023. (AP Photo/Rodrigo Abd)
FILE PHOTO GALLERY - Residents drive on a bridge, part of a federal highway project that extends over the Nanay River, in Iquitos, Peru, May 26, 2024. Construction work is at a standstill as the government conducts a study of the area, but the Ministry of Transportation has already built what is the country's largest bridge, which extends 2.3 kilometers (1.4 miles) over the Nanay, a tributary of the Amazon River. (AP Photo/Rodrigo Abd)
FILE PHOTO GALLERY - A protester’s dentures fly out of his mouth while running for cover as police on motorcycle work to disperse a demonstration of retirees demanding higher pensions, in Buenos Aires, Argentina, March 5, 2025. (AP Photo/Rodrigo Abd)
FILE PHOTO GALLERY - A police car goes up in flames, set on fire during a protest led by soccer fans in support of retirees demanding higher pensions and opposing austerity measures implemented by Javier Milei's government, in Buenos Aires, Argentina, March 12, 2025. (AP Photo/Rodrigo Abd, File)
