Lu Guang, an award winning Chinese photojournalist and social activist is missing in Xinjiang province china. He was invited to attend state photographer competition in Urumqi, China and after competition he was out to Western Kashgar with a friend to meet Ethnic Uighur and other Muslim groups. He is missing since then and had last contact with his New York based family on 3rd November.
57 year old, freelancer photographer and three times World Press photo award winner is held by Xinjiang police and his wife have not heard any notice from police yet
Lu Guang played a role to up skirt the negative side of Chinese industrial revolution and became a voice to Muslim minorities against sensitive environment and social issue like industrial pollution, drug addiction and HIV AIDS.
Now, a permanent resident of United States, Lu Guang was born in Zhejiang province, china in 1961. He started photography in 1980 when he was a factory worker in his hometown Yongkang County.
Factory worker in Wuhai City, Inner Mongolia. April 2005)Between 1993 and 1995 he adopted photography as profession and joined Freelancer community.Lu Guang has been a part of major documentary projects focusing on major industrial, social, environment and humanity crises China is facing today.
A heavy truck carrying coal and lime passing away, leaving dust and pollution harming for local residents)
His major projects including stories of gold diggers, SARS epidemic, drug addiction along Sino-Burmese border communities, AIDS villages in Henan Province, industrial pollution and medical effects of schistosomiasis (Bilharzia).
11-year-old Xu is diagnosed with bone cancer. Hutsou, China.He won the first prize on his AIDS village work in the Contemporary issues category in 2004 World Press photo contest. His stories including drug addiction in Yunnan got attention worldwide and invited by United States Department of state as visiting scholar.
Pollution problems created a lot of consensus around for Children living in industrial district.He won Henri Nannan prize in photography in Germany in 2008 and in 2009, he was nominated for W. Eugene Smith Memorial fund and he is also a National Geographic photography Grant nominee since 2010.
A pipeline of Newport Oil Wharf exploded in July 2010, resulted in sending tons of oil into the sea and the cleanup task was assigned to fishing boats
In 2004, in many villages across china, a major issue raised when people infected to HIV after selling their blood. According to survey out of 3000 people who donated blood, 678 contracted HIV and 200 immediately died
A wife crying over her husband, a victim of AIDS
A woman carrying her grandson is praying for the return of devil of pain
Disabled orphans who are adopted by social workers
Children infected with cerebral palsy are eating milk powder
Laseng Temples. The temple has history in research on medicine since Mongolian times. Now the place is evacuated for industries. Place can be seen with few pilgrims.His wife, Xu Xiaoli told in social media post that he is missing since 3rd November.
Many companies are now shifted from east part of country to its central and western part
Many steel plants dump their mineral processing waste into tailings dams. The dam is responsible to provide water for agricultural purposes
Pollution is created many environmental and humanity issues in China
Many factories have license to dump their chemical waste into sea
Xintang town, which is famous for producing Denim jeans, worker grind stone for denim every morning
Mrs Qu is held by her husband. She fell when he returned to her village full of pollution to celebrate spring festival and died after two hours of this photograph
Families living in industrial region and don’t have expenses to meet up medical facilities
A young girl warming her hands in winter. Her father is infected of HIV and takes cares for five children and parents
Two girls preparing for funeral of their six-year-old brother who died of AIDS
Mrs Xu, contacted his friend wife back in china, the person who invited Lu to Xinjiang. She told that both Mr Lu and her husband had been detained by local security from Zhejiang province.
An old man is preparing for funeral of his granddaughter. Her father is working in other province. The child had breathing problem and the ratio of stub born children is increasing since 2004 and reason is the lot of industries and their increasing air pollution ever since.
Twitter abuzz following Lu Guang missing:
After mysterious disappearance, the news got concerns over media and people are supporting the cause.
There is lot of resemblance between Mr Lu and Jamal Khashoggi say Kathleen
One of the world’s most influential documentary photographers is detained in China. I wrote about Lu Guang, how his work has gotten under the skin of the Communist Party of China and why we all should be alarmed by his disappearance. https://t.co/q1YWPqvAKt
— Kathleen McLaughlin (@kemc) December 18, 2018
And some big giants like New York Times came into play.
The police in China have confirmed the arrest of Lu Guang, the acclaimed Chinese photographer, who disappeared last month in Xinjiang, a region where hundreds of thousands of Muslims are held in internment camps https://t.co/XCRR3cpEOM
— The New York Times (@nytimes) December 14, 2018
Mr Lu is the part of the campaign that is targeting worldwide detained Journalist.
Please send postcards to show your support for the 251 journalists who are currently imprisoned around the world right now. #FreeThePress @columbiajourn @pressfreedom #LuGuang #Shawkan pic.twitter.com/lxkdCcDiyp
— Giacomo Tognini (@giacomotognini) December 14, 2018
Even non-political agencies are supporting this cause.
Former World Press Photo winner Lu Guang has been arrested in China. It is troubling that visual journalists around the world are being detained: https://t.co/cJ0xFaXzLq
— World Press Photo (@WorldPressPhoto) December 14, 2018
Last but not least, the voices against this terror is getting support in china too.
The family of Famous photographer #LuGuang received a phone call from the Kashgar police to confirm that #卢广 was officially arrested by the Kashgar Public Security Bureau. https://t.co/rz4qK2Mdra
— 北风（温云超, Yunchao Wen） (@wenyunchao) December 12, 2018
Let us know you thoughts.
