U.S. Military Killing Journalists?
/A controversy over the U.S.
military’s killing of journalists in Iraq has forced the resignation of
the Cable News Network’s chief news executive, Eason Jordan, who has
been with CNN since 1982. In January, as a panelist at the World
Economic Forum in Switzerland, Jordan said he thought several such
journalists had been targeted. He soon backed off and apologized,
saying they were killed "accidentally." (AP 2-12-05.) Jordan was right
the first time, evidence indicates. That the U.S. military has targeted
news media is a fact beyond dispute – and such actions are war crimes.
During the Clinton-NATO war on Yugoslavia in 1999, Radio Television
Serbia in Belgrade was bombed and sixteen editorial, technical, and
office personnel died. In an impromptu interview by Jeremy Scahill last
year, the general in charge of that war, Wesley Clark, admitted that
the bombing was intentional. (Pacifica Radio, Jan. 26, 2004.) One week
into the current war in Iraq, the Iraqi radio and television
headquarters in Baghdad were bombed. Casualties were not reported. The
Paris-based Reporters Without Borders futilely called for an impartial
international investigation. Robert Menard, its secretary general, said
that "a media outlet cannot be a military target under international
law...." He called attacks on any civilians, including journalists, war
crimes. At least a dozen media people are known to have died from
violence involving the U.S. military in Iraq. The incidents are
described below. The first four cases appear relatively clear-cut,
although the military admits no wrongdoing in any case.
Five deaths, six incidents, no "accidents"
- An air raid on the Al-Jazeera TV
offices in Baghdad killed the journalist Tareq Ayoub and wounded a
colleague on April 8, 2003. The network had shown civilian victims of
U.S. bombings. Big banners marked "TV" hung outside the building.
- Six days earlier, the Basra
Sheraton Hotel, whose only guests were an Al-Jazeera team, received
four direct artillery hits, without casualties, according to the Arabic
TV news channel. And in November 2001, U.S. bombs destroyed
Al-Jazeera’s office in Kabul, Afghanistan, also without casualties.
Before all three incidents, the network had notified U.S. authorities
of the respective locations, a spokesman said.
- Within three hours after the
Baghdad bombing, a tank fired at the Palestine Hotel there and fatally
wounded two cameramen: Taras Protsyuk, a Ukranian, of Reuters; and Jose
Couso, a Spaniard, of the Telecinco network. The French Press Agency
reported next day that footage by France 3 television "shows a US tank
targeting the journalists’ hotel and waiting at least two minutes
before firing." The Department of Defense claimed the shooting was
self-defense. Reporters Without Borders said that all the facts
indicated "exactly the opposite." The International Federation of
Journalists (IFJ), based in Brussels, accused the Pentagon of a
"cynical whitewash." Robert Fisk of the UK newspaper Independent asked
if it was possible to believe that the twin Baghdad attacks were
accidents. "Or was it possible that the right word for these killings
... was murder?"
- Tank fire also killed the
Palestinian cameraman Mazen Dana of Reuters outside of Abu Ghraib
prison on August 18, 2003. The U.S. Army claimed that soldiers mistook
his camera for a weapon. But colleagues with him said otherwise. The
Guardian, UK, next day quoted a Reuters soundman, Nael al-Shyoukhi,
saying the soldiers "saw us and they knew about our identities and our
mission.... We were noted and seen clearly." They had filmed the prison
and were about to go when a convoy led by a tank arrived; Dana stepped
out of the car to film again, walked a bit and was shot. IFJ noted that
it happened in broad daylight and that the camera team had made contact
with soldiers to explain its mission and received permission to film
the prison.
- Dhia Najim, an Iraqi freelance cameraman working for Reuters, in Ramadi, west of Baghdad, was shot to death, evidently by a U.S. sniper, on Nov. 1, 2004. He had been filming clashes between marines and foes, but exchanges had ended when he was felled by a single shot. Najim’s colleagues and family said a U.S. sniper killed him. Military authorities denied it. Reuters noted that photographs taken two days earlier showed marine snipers taking positions in Ramadi. The news agency called for an investigation. [more]
