2024 World Press Photo Contest: Winners revealed

A photograph of two migrants who met in Mexico and fell in love on their way to the United States is one of a series that helped Alejandro Cegarra win the Long-Term Project Award, one of the top four prizes in this year's World Press Photo Contest.

Honduran Rosa Bello (left) and Venezuelan Ruben Soto are pictured atop a freight train known as The Beast.

Cegarra's own experience, of migrating to Mexico from Venezuela, had helped him respectfully and sensitively document the dangers faced and resilience shown, the jury said.

Warning: Some readers may find some of the following images distressing

Asylum seekers and other migrants too poor to pay a smuggler often ride cargo trains to the US border.

Venezuelan Carlos Mendoza crosses the Rio Grande river to seek asylum in the US.

Six regional juries compiled a short list from more than 61,000 entries by nearly 4,000 photographers from 130 countries.

"These final selected works are a tapestry of our world today, centred on images we believe were made with respect and integrity, that can speak universally and resonate far beyond their origins," the Guardian's head of photography, Fiona Shields, who chaired the global jury, said.

"This is an opportunity to applaud the work of press and documentary photographers everywhere - made with courage, intelligence and ingenuity - and to amplify the importance of the stories they are telling, often in unimaginable circumstances."

Dada Paul and his granddaughter Odliatemix prepare for church.

Lee-Ann Olwage won Story of the Year with an intimate study of "Dada" Paul Rakotozandriny, 91, who lives with dementia, in Madagascar, cared for by his daughter Fara.

"This story tackles a universal health issue through the lens of family and care," the jury said.

"The selection of images are composed with warmth and tenderness, reminding viewers of the love and closeness necessary in a time of war and aggression worldwide."

Fara watches Dada Paul clean a fish, as he does every Sunday afternoon. His fingers tremble but he finds the task calming.

The Photo of the Year shows Inas Abu Maamar, 36, cradling the body of her niece Saly, five, killed, along with her mother and sister, when an Israeli missile struck their home, in Khan Younis, Gaza.

Mohammed Salem had been photographing residents searching for missing relatives at the Nasser Hospital morgue, for the Reuters agency, just days after his own wife gave birth.

The image was composed with care and respect, offering both a metaphorical and literal glimpse into unimaginable loss, the jury said.

Salem called it a "powerful and sad moment that sums up the broader sense of what was happening in the Gaza Strip".

Inas Abu Maamar cradles her niece Saly's body.

Julia Kochetova's work in Ukraine won the Open Format Award.

Weaving together photos, poetry, audio clips, and music, she and a Ukrainian illustrator and DJ created a website documenting war as an everyday reality.

Here are some of the regional winners, with captions from the competition.

Africa, Singles: Returning Home from War, by Vincent Haiges, for Real 21

Kibrom Berhane, 24, greets his mother for the first time since joining the Tigray Defense Forces, two years earlier. He lost his leg a month before the peace agreement. And impressed by Kibrom's determination to return to his everyday life, the photographer wanted to show the war's hidden consequences.

Asia, Stories: Afghanistan on the Edge, by Ebrahim Noroozi, for Associated Press

Children stare at an apple their mother brought home after begging in a camp for internally displaced people, on the outskirts of the Afghan capital. Kabul.

Europe, Singles: A Father's Pain, by Adem Altan, for Agence France-Presse

Mesut Hançer holds the hand of his daughter Irmak, 15, killed while asleep when her grandmother's home collapsed during an earthquake in southern Turkey.

Europe, Stories: Kakhovka Dam: Flood in a War Zone, by Johanna Maria Fritz, for Die Zeit

Volunteers Viktor and Oleksandr help evacuate the home of Maria and her daughter Svitlana, after explosions damaged the wall of the Russian-controlled Kakhovka Dam, in south-east Ukraine, causing extensive floods in Kherson, downstream on the Dnipro River.

North and Central America, Singles: A Day in the Life of a Quebec Fire Crew, by Charles-Frédérick Ouellet, for the Globe and Mail and Conseil des arts et des lettres du Québec (CALQ)

Theo Dagnaud scans the horizon to ensure firefighter patrols have left and he can mark the area as "controlled". Fuelled by high temperatures and dry conditions, gigantic summer forest fires swept across Canada in 2023, affecting all 13 provinces and territories, especially northern parts of Quebec.

North and Central America, Stories: Saving the Monarchs, by Jaime Rojo, for National Geographic

Butterflies stream through protected indigenous fir forests in the Monarch Butterfly Biosphere Reserve. The mountain hillsides of Oyamel forest, in Mexico, provide an ideal overwintering microclimate.

South America, Singles: Drought in the Amazon, by Lalo de Almeida, for Folha de São Paulo

In 2023, the Amazon's most intense drought since recordkeeping began disproportionately affected indigenous, rural, and river communities. Those in Porto Praia had to walk kilometres along the dry riverbed to reach their homes.

South America, Stories: Red Skies, Green Waters, by Adriana Loureiro Fernandez, for the New York Times

Neighbours in Punta de Mata play Animal Lotto under a sky lit by one of the world's largest gas flares. The story aims to portray the harmful effects of industry on both the environment and the social fabric of Venezuela.

South East Asia and Oceania, Singles: Fighting, Not Sinking, by Eddie Jim, for The Age and Sydney Morning Herald

Community elder Lotomau Fiafia, 72, stands with his grandson John, in Salia bay, Kioa island, Fiji, at the point where he remembers the shoreline used to be when he was a boy.

South East Asia and Oceania, Stories: Battle for Sovereignty, by Michael Varcas, for the Philippine Star

Fisherman Arnel Satam, 54, stands in his tiny wooden boat, after being chased by the China Coast Guard, trying enter the lagoon of Scarborough Shoal, part of the Philippines' exclusive economic zone. China reinforces its claims in the South China Sea with island-building and naval patrols, raising concerns the region is becoming a flashpoint, with potentially serious global consequences.

The World Press Photo exhibition can be seen at Borough Yards, London, 3 - 27 May 2024.

All photographs courtesy World Press Photo Foundation