The girl with green eyes grows up

Eighteen years on: the eyes are the same, but the face is much more wary

Steve McCurry's award-winning photograph of the girl with green eyes appeared on the front cover of the National Geographic Magazine in 1984.

It was used in countless posters and charity appeals - and came to symbolise the plight of Afghanistan, in the years following the Soviet invasion.

As a twelve year old refugee...the girl with green eyes

Steve never knew the name of the girl whose photo he'd taken.

Through an interpreter, he'd found out the bare bones of her story.

Her parents died when she was just six years old, when the Russians had attacked her village.

With her grandmother, two sisters and a brother, she'd made the difficult and dangerous trek into Pakistan, where she lived in a refugee camp.

Attack on Afghanistan

As a professional photo-journalist, Steve's career moved on.

But, as the US launched attacks on Al Qaida strongholds in Afghanistan last Autumn, Steve decided to try to track down the girl with green eyes, to see what had happened to her.

Steve McCurry: followed several false leads

There were several false leads. One girl he met had a story which exactly matched the one he'd heard, apart from one vital detail.

Her eyes were brown.

But, eventually he tracked down the girl's brother, living near the Al Qaida stronghold of Tora Bora.

Surprised by her own fame

"It took a lot of hard work and a bit of luck to find her," he told Breakfast.

The striking twelve year old was now 29, and had three daughters of her own.

She was surprised and a bit bewildered - and also embarrassed because there was a rip in her shawl

Steve McCurry

She'd aged much more than a Western woman would in the same time, but her eyes were still the same.

"She'd never seen the photograph I took originally," said Steve, "and nor had anyone in the camp she was living in.

"She was surprised and a bit bewildered - and also a bit embarrassed because there's a rip in her shawl on the original photograph.

"We told her a lot of people were inspired by her face and her dignity."

Steve thinks that the woman's expression is far more wary than the girl's, partly because of the taboos surrounding photography in Afghanistan.

"Women are not supposed to be seen: she needed the permission of her husband before we could take this photo, " he explains.

To watch Steve McCurry's full interview on BBC One Breakfast, click on the grey box at the top right hand side of this page