Emmanuel Giroud, 46, has been appointed head of the Cairo bureau and will take up the post in August. Hired onto AFP's international desk in 1996, he has worked in Lyon, Ajaccio and Nairobi. Emmanuel also ran the Islamabad bureau for several years and was chief of the Europe desk in Paris prior to this latest appointment.

AFP photographer Adrian Dennis has won photograph of the year at the press photographer’s 2013 competition for his striking image of Thai rider Nina Lamsan Ligon and her horse at the London Olympics. He also won the Sports Folio of the Year and Olympic Folio categories in the competition that rewards the best photographs in the British media.

AFP will be transmitting photographs from the 100th Tour de France in virtual real time thanks to innovative satellite technology which will allow transmission from motor cycles following the race.   AFP is installing auto-pointing satellite terminals which can transmit at rest or on the move.   They will allow photographers to send their images at any moment and in virtual real time, and will be particularly effective in stretches of the Tour where the phone network is insufficient to carry the agency’s production.

AFP is sending a 40 strong team to the Confederations Cup, which runs from June 15 to 30 in Brazil and is seen as a rehearsal for next year’s World Cup.

AFP and Relaxnews, which already offer their AFP-Relaxnews service in English and in French, are launching the service in Brazil on June 26.

AFP photographers scooped two gold medals, one silver and two bronze as the agency’s photographers dominated the annual Sportsfolio photo festival in Narbonne, France.

Some of its best photos from 2012 will be shown by the International News Agency AFP at the Photo Festival The Browse opening on June 13, 2013 in the German capital.

The international news agency Agence France-Presse (AFP) has awarded the 2013 Kate Webb Prize for frontline journalism to Indonesian investigative reporter Stefanus Teguh Edi Pramono for his searing reportages on the bloody civil war in Syria and his eye-opening investigation into the murky underworld of the Jakarta drug trade.

AFP’s cutting edge photo coverage of the London Olympics is the focus of its exhibition at the Sportfolio Festival in the French Mediterranean city of Narbonne which runs from June 1 to 18.

AFP will broadcast live video of France’s first same-sex wedding, which will be held in the southern city of Montpellier today, Wednesday May 29. Two AFP cameras – one inside and one outside the city hall – will cover the wedding, which has attracted huge international interest.