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"

1. 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.
   
2. 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.
   
3. 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?" 
   
4. 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.
   
5. 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]