My friend Nick's photo that helped end a war.

My dear friend Nick Ut, Pulitzer Prize Winner, fellow photographer and who I have been fortunate enough to exhibit with,including with this photo, has issued a statement confirming he took the historic and world changing photo of Kim Phuc below.

In a moving statement Nick thanks his friends with gratitude and talked through the fact and circumstances that led to the this prize winning photo, that ended the war. I am sharing this for Nick as he lives through this unfathomable slander and disinformation. He suffers the awful misfortune of someone trying to claim his Vietnam photography work as his. As others try to steal and copy our work or sow misinformation and falsehoods - we must stand up and protect originality copyright and the truth.

I had a very well known published,exhibited and viral photograph of mine reshot by a plagiarist and end up as the President’s book cover. Same framing, crop everything. And worse the copycatter fashion photographer stole my words from my exhibit, and reviewers words for my exhibit in his summation of his book cover photo. My photo was taken and published years before and went viral at the time and was also 3-4 years before the book was published. I know the path that the photographer took. It was a clear breach. Penguin Publishing Group apologised to me and praised me on my beautiful work but the damage done. Like Nick,as impactful as my work is and has been it does not afford me the luxury of getting legal teams for transgressions.

They say “ imitation is flattery” but it is not when your work is stolen and others profit from it , in any way. If you are an academic or scientist, it is the same as your paper and work being stolen, used profted form and not credited . It is unacceptable. I support Nick 1000 percent .

Excerpts: "I spent many years learning the craft from age 16 in and around Saigon. I was fortunate enough to be at the right place, at the right time when on June 8, 1972, napalm was dropped on a group of civilians in Trang Bang and I captured the now iconic image seen around the world of Kim Phuc and her family, running away from the burning building after Napalm was dropped on them. At the time, there were other journalists with me, including my witnesses Dave Burnett, Peter Arnett and Fox Butterfield from the New York Times.....That image was credited with helping end the war in my country. More than 50 years later, I cannot understand why Mr. Carl Robinson, a fellow employee of the AP in Saigon at the time, would make up a story and claim I did not take that iconic photo, The Terror or War aka Napalm Girl. No one else has the right to claim that I did not take that specific or any other photo attributed to me because I am the creator of all the work I’ve done since day one. My career spans more than 50 years and, although I am now retired from the AP, I continue to create impacting images for the world to see."