captures

Dramatic video filmed on a plane carrying DR Congo’s mining minister captured the moment it crashed on landing at an airport in Kolwezi in the southeast. No casualties have been reported. The minister was travelling to the site of a recent mining disaster.

RSF is burning and burying bodies near a university, mosque, camp for the displaced people, and hospital in el-Fasher, Yale University researchers say.

The government-aligned Sudanese Armed Forces (SAF) have recaptured two territories in the North Kordofan state from the Rapid Support Forces (RSF), as the paramilitary group continues burning and burying bodies in Darfur’s el-Fasher to hide evidence of mass killings.

Footage circulating online this week showed army soldiers holding assault rifles and rocket-propelled grenades celebrating their takeovers of Kazqil and Um Dam Haj Ahmed in North Kordofan, the state where intense fighting is expected to rage over the coming weeks.

Kazqil, which had fallen to the RSF in late October, is located south of el-Obeid, the strategic capital city of the state in central Sudan, which the paramilitary group is trying to capture from the army.

أبطال القوات المسلحة من داخل ” كازقيل” بولاية شمال كردفان#السودان #السودان_ينتصر pic.twitter.com/wVflEodHK5

— Sudan News 🇸🇩 (@Sudan_tweet) November 15, 2025

The fighting between the two rival generals leading the army and the paramilitary group, which started in April 2023, has increasingly turned east over the past weeks as the RSF solidifies control over the western parts of the war-torn country, now in its third year of a brutal civil war.

The fighting, fuelled by arms supplies from the region, has created what the United Nations has called the largest displacement crisis in the world. More than 12 million people have been forced from their homes, and tens of thousands have been killed and injured. The UN has also confirmed starvation in parts of the country.

The RSF said last week it accepted a ceasefire proposal put forward by the United States and other mediators, with the announcement coming after an international outcry over atrocities committed by the paramilitary group in el-Fasher, the capital of North Darfur state in western Sudan.

But the army has refused to agree to a ceasefire under the current battle lines, and both sides have continued to amass troops and equipment in the central parts of the country to engage in more battles.

The RSF launched an offensive against the Kordofan region at the same time as it took el-Fasher late last month, seizing the town of Bara in North Kordofan state as a crucial link between Darfur and central Sudan. The army had recaptured the town just two months earlier.

Satellite images reveal mass graves

More than two and a half weeks after fully capturing el-Fasher from the army, the RSF has continued to dispose of bodies in large numbers.

An analysis of satellite imagery released by Yale’s Humanitarian Research Lab (HRL) on Friday exposed four new locations where paramilitary fighters are disposing of bodies in and around el-Fasher.

Activities consistent with body disposal are visible at the University of Alfashir, a structure on the edge of Abu Shouk camp for internally displaced people, a neighbourhood near al-Hikma Mosque, and at Saudi Hospital, where RSF forces massacred hundreds.

The HRL could not conclude how many people the RSF had killed or how quickly, but it said the observations are alarming, given the fact that the whereabouts of many civilian residents remain unknown.

🚨ATROCITY ALERT🚨@HRL_YaleSPH has identified four new locations where the RSF is disposing of bodies in and around El Fasher. #KeepEyesonSudan

🛰️@Vantortechhttps://t.co/y5gaMRlBm2 pic.twitter.com/OsCVb1ihTf

— Humanitarian Research Lab (HRL) at YSPH (@HRL_YaleSPH) November 14, 2025

Nathaniel Raymond, the lead researcher of that report, said an estimated 150,000 civilians are unaccounted for, and daily monitoring of city streets shows no activity in markets or water points, but only RSF patrols and many bodies.

“We can see them charred. So the question is, where are the people and where are the bodies coming from?” he told Al Jazeera.

Raymond said the evidence also includes numerous videos released by the RSF fighters themselves, who are “the most prodigious producers of evidence about their own crimes”.

Alfredo Flores is always moving, but you wouldn’t know it from the precise stills he takes of Sabrina Carpenter emerging onstage, her cheekiness and sparkly go-go boots shining through his images.

The portfolio of 36-year-old Flores, Carpenter’s tour photographer, is already familiar to most. Those photos of Carpenter posed with the tour stop’s city labeled on a mug and sealed with a kiss — that’s Flores’ work.

He has captured Carpenter’s rise from her “Emails I Can’t Send” era to the dazzlingly successful Short n’ Sweet tour, the work from which earned Flores the iHeart Radio Award for favorite tour photographer and puts him back on the road next week for an additional North American leg, including her six-night run at Crypto.com Arena next week.

But Carpenter’s towel reveals, set changes and winks won’t look exactly the same.

“Creatively, I just try my best to figure out different ways to shoot the same show,” said Flores, fresh off VMAs adrenaline and the release buzz of Carpenter’s latest album, “Man’s Best Friend.”

He constantly alters angles and lenses, including long, short and fish-eye, all with his Canon — the camera brand he’s been loyal to his entire career. However, that doesn’t make his first forays into photography any less impactful.

Alfredo Flores smiling with Sabrina Carpenter.

(Courtesy of Alfredo Flores)

Flores’ trajectory as a live music photographer is informed by the era he grew up in, one of disposable cameras, 24-hour photo labs, VHS camcorders, photo books full of family vacation pictures and the visionaries behind the hits that made us press the replay button on CD players.

He recalls his path was charted before him one afternoon in his native Belleview, N.J., on a sick day home from school in the form of the VH1 show “Pop-Up Video,” which featured music videos accompanied by trivia-filled text bubbles.

“It was Mariah Carey’s music video for ‘Honey,’ and it said, ‘This video is directed by Paul Hunter. The location is Puerto Rico. This is an extra. This is a body double,’ ” said Flores, who added, “And it clicked in my brain, ‘Oh, this is something that people create’ … and that’s where my interest really peaked in a more professional way.”

In 2008, when the ultimate music video platform was no longer VH1, but YouTube, Flores moved to Los Angeles and sought out the minds who inspired him — the directors and producers who shaped his camcorder and disposable days, before he ever strapped a Canon around his neck.

“I went to the [Geffen Records] offices every day until I got a yes,” said Flores.

He spent his initial internship days showcasing his perceptive eye by compiling magazine photos for music video storyboards. It was this eye that quickly put Flores on set, shooting bonus footage for a 2009 Nickelodeon production, “School Gyrls.” The made-for-TV movie featured a certain Canadian teen who benefited from the YouTube boom.

The Justin Bieber cameo would develop into a working relationship, allowing Flores to pursue the art form that prompted his move to Los Angeles: directing music videos.

Flores’s music video for Bieber’s song “Love Me” encapsulates the early stages of Bieber’s career. Flores intercut Bieber singing to the camera with footage of fans, behind-the-scenes chats with Usher and numerous angles of Bieber’s signature look — the swoop that inspired hair flips round the world.

Years later, in 2020, when the world stopped, Flores didn’t. He co-directed Bieber once again for the “Stuck with U” music video, a montage of loved ones dancing and embracing in their homes. It was 4 minutes and 17 seconds of celebrated togetherness in the midst of government-enforced close proximity. The song is a duet between Bieber and Ariana Grande, an artist whom Flores defines as a “once-in-a-lifetime kind of talent.”

Flores spent much of the 2010s working with Grande, all angles taken into consideration. From her upside-down album cover for “Thank U, Next” to co-directing her more festive side for the “Santa Tell Me” video to incorporating nostalgia into a Grande-Victoria Monét collaboration, “Monopoly.” Co-directing the friendship anthem’s music video, Flores nodded to a ‘90s upbringing by using a decent amount of camcorder footage.

“Joan [Grande’s mom] probably has so many VHS videos of Ari growing up. And Beth [Carpenter’s mom] has so many VHS recordings of Sabrina,” he said.

The artistic journeys of Carpenter, Grande and Flores are intertwined with the sought-after music video director Dave Meyers. The Grammy winner has bestowed the world with distinct visuals, such as Kendrick Lamar re-creating “The Last Supper” while rapping “HUMBLE.,” Britney Spears accepting an acting award in the midst of belting out “Lucky,” and Grande as an ethereal being singing “God Is a Woman.”

Meyers directed two music videos for Carpenter’s “Short n’ Sweet” album with Flores as the behind-the-scenes photographer. Both videos helped facilitate Carpenter’s catapult into the cultural lexicon with the summer-infused shots in “Espresso” and the “Death Becomes Her” story line in “Taste.”

Alfredo Flores in the photo pit for Sabrina Carpenter.

(Courtesy of Alfredo Flores)

“BTS for me in the hands of Alfredo feels like a living yearbook of the experience we all had. I’m so deep in the creative process that I’m not self-aware of what’s happening, and to re-watch through his work allows me to enjoy the stories being told all around us. The capturing of the actual process, the passion we all share to create — those are the stories he captures over and over,” said Meyers.

Often, Flores takes those candid moments even further with a Polaroid camera — he points, shoots and hopes for the best. The instant photo is at the mercy of light and luck, which are part of the magic, he said.

“It’s the color, the grain, the imperfection of it all,” he said.

By definition, pop music is inextricably tied to its time period, the subject matter and sound speaking to its modern, often younger audiences. This can denote a fleeting quality, a trend to pass us by, not unlike the evolution of photography and videography.

However, the artists of today suggest otherwise. Carpenter covered Abba’s hit “Mamma Mia.” Grande sampled ‘N Sync in her “Thank U, Next” album. Both MTV and VH1 still have something to teach the music video directors of today. There’s lasting power in pop songs as are the mediums we associate with them. Who are we creatively if not an amalgamation of all we’ve seen, the people we know, the ways in which we originally consumed them?

“When I work with an artist we have longevity,” said Flores.

Not a surprising sentiment from the man taking a backstage Polaroid picture of a Gen Z pop star who praises disco.