A photograph of German Chancellor Gerhard Schröder being embraced by French President Jacques Chirac won the Georges Bendrihem Prize at a ceremony in the German capital on Wednesday. The winning image was taken by Reuters photographer Vincent Kessler during ceremonies for the 60th anniversary of the D-Day landings in Normandy on June 6 last year. France's ambassador to Germany, Claude Martin, presented the prize, which includes a cheque for 7,000 euros ($8,820). The Georges Bendrihem Prize was created in 1996 in memory of the AFP photographer of the same name who died in a road accident at the age of 63 while covering a visit by Chirac to Tunisia in 1995. It is awarded annually for the best photograph of a European political figure. Bruno Vincent of Getty Images took the second prize for a shot of the future Spanish Prime Minister Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero, his face enigmatically obscured by a flag, as he claimed victory in the Spanish general election in March last year. Francois Bouchon of French newspaper Le Figaro won third prize for a picture of a sitting Chirac surrounded by his leading ministers on Bastille Day celebrations in Paris last year. The jury for the prize, chaired by the head of Berlin's
Martin-Gropius-Bau museum, Gereon Sievernich, chose the winner from 180 photographs taken by 63 photographers from 15 countries.