Hetherington spent much of the next decade in West Africa, documenting political upheaval and its effects on daily life in Liberia, Sierra Leone, Nigeria, and other countries. In the Second Liberian Civil War, he and his broadcast colleague James Martin Brabazon were the only foreign journalists to live behind rebel lines, which earned them an execution order from then-Liberian President Charles Taylor. Hetherington was a photographer on Liberia: An Uncivil War (2004) and The Devil Came on Horseback (2007). In 2006, Hetherington took a break from image-making to work as an investigator for the United Nations Security Council's Liberia Sanctions Committee.
Hetherington won the 2007 World Press Photo competition for his picture of a tired American soldier covering his face with his hand following a day of fighting in the Korangal valley, Afghanistan. The work was made for Vanity Fair, for which he was a contributing photographer. Hetherington made several trips to Afghanistan in 2007 and 2008 with writer Sebastian Junger; the two collaborated on the 2010 documentary Restrepo based on their assignment in Afghanistan. The film received the Grand Jury Prize for best documentary at the 2010 Sundance Film Festival.
Hetherington received a 2009 Alfred I. duPont Award in broadcast journalism, and the 2008 Rory Peck Features award for his broadcast work titled Afghanistan – The Other War, which was also made in the Korangal Valley and aired on Nightline, a programme of ABC News.
(excerpts taken from Wikipedia)
