In pictures: Images charting migrants’ struggles win Pulitzer prize

Earlier this week, eight AP staff and freelance photographers –  Ivan Valencia, Eduardo Verdugo, Felix Marquez, Marco Ugarte, Fernando Llano, Eric Gay, Gregory Bull and Christian Chavez – were awarded this year’s Pulitzer for feature photography for images documenting the complex, richly emotional experiences of people journeying to a new life.

Here are a selection of the photos for which they won the coveted journalism award, one for each photographer.

Fernando Llano

Migrants cross the Rio Bravo on an inflatable mattress into the United States from Matamoros, Mexico

Ivan Valencia

Haitian migrants wade through water as they cross the Darien Gap from Colombia to Panama in hopes of reaching the US

Gregory Bull

A group of migrants sleep in a makeshift campsite as they wait to apply for asylum after crossing the US border, near Jacumba, California

Eric Gay

A woman carries her child after she and other migrants crossed the Rio Grande and entered the U.S. from Mexico, in Eagle Pass, Texas

Eduardo Verdugo

A Venezuelan migrant laughs as she jokes with her husband as they wait along the rail lines in hopes of boarding a freight train heading north in Huehuetoca, Mexico

Felix Marquez

Migrants who were traveling to the U.S. inside a tractor-trailer are detained by Mexican immigration agents and National Guard members, in Veracruz, Mexico

Marco Ugarte

Migrants travel inside train cars of a northbound freight train, in Irapuato, Mexico

Christian Chavez

Migrants cross the Rio Grande river into the United States from Ciudad Juarez, Mexico