Pete Muller • Photographer Profile

In 2014 the world witnesses the largest outbreak of the lethal Ebola virus. Before surfacing in Guinea, and later spreading to Liberia and Sierra Leone, the virus was largely relegated to the remote forest regions of Central Africa where sporadic outbreaks were typically short lived and claimed a relatively small number of lives. It is thought that the scope of previous outbreaks was largely contained by virtue of the extremely remote and isolated nature of the environments in which they occurred. Hunters and other people who interact regularly with the forest and wildlife that lives there were typically the first victims. While no one yet knows where exactly the virus originates, researchers know that it lurks somewhere in the forest.

In the fall of 2013, the war between Congolese forces and rebels known as M23 culminated in a fierce battle on plains of volcanic rock in Congo’s east. For more than a year, M23—a formidable rebellion with ties to Rwanda and Uganda—had scored successive victories over the Congolese army, including the capture of Goma, the region’s most vital city. In late 2013, with enhanced support from the United Nations and the international community, the Congolese army resolved to crush the rebellion and launched one of the largest military campaigns in its recent history.

On July 9th, 2011, the swamps and plains of southern Sudan became the world’s 193rd country. For decades, across this vast and largely vacant landscape, unspeakable violence and devastation prevailed. More than two million people perished as southern rebels waged a 23-year rebellion against the northern government aimed at empowering the resource-rich but deeply marginalized south. In 2005, the war came to an ostensible end with an agreement that allowed for the prospect of southern independence in 2011, the same year in which the ceasefire expired.