San Fernando (Spain), Nov 10 (IANS/EFE) Spanish photographer Emilio Morenatti, who lost a foot in a roadside bomb explosion while working in Afghanistan last year, received Tuesday the first Freedom of Speech Prize for Journalistic Values.

Morenatti accepted the prize from Mayor Manuel Maria de Bernardo in the southern city of San Fernando, and from the president of the Cadiz Press Association, Fernando Santiago, at a ceremony in the Royal Theater of Las Cortes where 200 years ago freedom of the press was proclaimed in Spain.

After being awarded the statuette, a replica of the monument commemorating the date of the proclamation and designed by sculptor Alfonso Berraquero, the photographer recalled his colleague at The New York Times, Joao Silva, who Oct 23 was gravely injured when he stepped on a mine in southern Afghanistan.

Morenatti also expressed his gratitude for the support he received in the most difficult moments of his career, both last year when he was injured while riding in a US military vehicle in southern Afghanistan and the roadside bomb exploded, and in October 2006 when he was kidnapped for a day in Gaza.