By Liz Marlantes
BBCApril 8, 2003
Two cameramen, working for Spain's Telecinco and Reuters news agency, died and four other journalists were injured when an American tank blasted Baghdad's Palestine Hotel, where much of the foreign media is based. In a separate incident, a correspondent from the Qatar-based al-Jazeera network was killed and a colleague was hurt when at least one US missile hit the station's Baghdad office.
Two journalists - a Spaniard and a German - who were travelling with US forces were killed on Monday when an Iraqi missile struck their camp south of the city. The International Federation of Journalists - representing hundreds of thousands of journalists around the world - has condemned both sides in the Iraq war over the deaths of reporters. Twelve foreign journalists have died in Iraq since the start of the war, and two are missing.
Hotel hit
The heaviest casualties occurred when a US tank opened fire on the Palestine Hotel. Reuters said Ukrainian cameraman Taras Protsyuk died and a reporter, photographer, and a technician were wounded when the shell hit the 15th floor of the building. Reuters Editor-in-Chief Geert Linnebank said: "We are devastated by the death of Taras, who had distinguished himself with his highly professional coverage in some of the most violent conflicts of the past decade." Spanish television network Telecinco said its cameraman, Jose Couso, died after undergoing surgery for injuries sustained to his leg, chest and jaw.
Television pictures showed two people being carried on blankets through the lobby of the hotel, as journalists - some visibly shaken - rushed out of the building clutching their equipment. David Chater, a Sky television reporter said: "I noticed one of the tanks had its barrel pointed up at the building. We went inside... and there was an almighty crash, a huge explosion that shook the hotel."
US military officials expressed regret at the incident, and said one of their tanks had fired on the hotel in response to incoming sniper and rocket fire. "A tank was receiving small arms fire...from the hotel and engaged the target with one tank round," General Buford Blount, commander of the U.S. 3rd Infantry Division in Baghdad, told Reuters.
'Mistaken target'
Al-Jazeera said its correspondent Tareq Ayoub died and a cameraman was injured when two missiles hit its office, virtually destroying it. US military officials said the building was struck by mistake. "It is something we all regret. But I don't believe that it is possible that it was deliberate," US State Department spokesman Nabil Khoury told the network.
Two other foreign journalists - Julio Anguita Parrado, from the Spanish newspaper El Mundo, and Christian Liebig, who worked for the German weekly Focus - died when the US troops they were travelling with came under attack. Last month, in a report on the dangers of his assignment, Mr Liebig had quoted a US major as saying: "No story is worth dying for."
Abu Dhabi television said its Baghdad bureau was also hit by US bombing. The station broadcast footage of people carrying a wounded man to a jeep. On Tuesday, two Polish reporters turned up safe and well after escaping from Iraqi captors who had detained them at a checkpoint south of Baghdad the previous day. Marcin Firlej, from TVN24 news channel, and Jacek Kaczmarek, from Polish state radio, slipped away when the town they were being held in came under attack, Mr Firlej's wife told TVN24.
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