Best of AP — Honorable Mention

Peru’s disappeared: Dozens look for relatives lost to violence. A woman who knows their sorrow helps

Lidia Flores, the leader of the National Association of Relatives of Detained and Disappeared Persons of Peru, poses for a portrait in Ayacucho, Peru, Tuesday, Oct. 22, 2024. Flores' husband was killed in Peru's internal armed conflict (1980-2000). (AP Photo/Silvio La Rosa)
Peru Disappeared

Many of the thousands who have disappeared in Latin America over decades have never been found, presumed victims of dictatorships, insurgencies, or organized crime. While the mass disappearances in Argentina and Chile are well known, similarly wrenching traumas elsewhere in the region have received far less attention.

Over several months, religion reporter Maria Teresa Hernandez traveled to Peru, Colombia, and Paraguay, where many families continue to search for answers, enduring years of uncertainty and a lack of official justice.

Several people shared haunting stories of their quests with Hernandez. AP photographers Guadalupe Pardo, Ivan Valencia, Silvio La Rosa, and Jorge Saenz provided compelling images to accompany her stories in both Spanish and English.

The judges commended Hernandez for shedding light on this ongoing tragedy in places often overlooked by global media and for putting human faces to the struggles of thousands of families.

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