IRAQ - 8 April 2003
Reporters Without Borders outraged at bombing of Al-Jazeera office in Baghdad
Reporters Without Borders expressed outrage at today's US bombing of the Baghdad office of the pan-Arab TV station Al-Jazeera that killed one of its journalists, cameraman Tarek Ayoub, and wounded another. The nearby premises of Abu Dhabi TV were also damaged.
"We strongly condemn this attack on an neighbourhood known to include the offices of several TV stations," said secretary-general Robert Ménard in a letter to Gen. Tommy Franks, commander of US military operations in Iraq.
"To ensure the safety of its journalists, Al-Jazeera's management has been careful to inform the Americans of the exact location of its crews right from the start of the war. The US army cannot therefore claim it did not know where the Baghdad offices were.
"Did it at least warn the journalists about an imminent bombing? The outcome was predictable: yet another journalist was killed covering this very deadly war for the media," Ménard said.
He called on Franks to make a serious and thorough investigation of who was responsible for the attack and why it was carried out.
An Al-Jazeera journalist who was in Baghdad until a few days ago told Reporters Without Borders that "it couldn't've been a mistake. We've told the Pentagon where all our offices are in Iraq and hung giant banners outside them saying 'TV.'"
Ayoub, a Jordanian who was the station's permanent correspondent in Amman, was sent to beef up the team in Iraq when the war broke out. He was seriously wounded in today's attack and died soon afterwards.
The Al-Jazeera offices are in an apartment block between the Mansour Hotel and the ministry of planning, in a central Baghdad area of government offices. Another of the station's journalists, Zohair al-Iraqi, an Iraqi, received a neck wound in the attack.
One of Al-Jazeera's vehicles, which was clearly marked, came under fire from US forces on a motorway near Baghdad on 7 April. The station said its office in Basra was directly shelled on 2 April.
Four members of the Al-Jazeera crew in Basra, the only journalists inside the city, came under gunfire from British tanks on 29 March as they were filming distribution of food by Iraqi government officials. One of the station's cameramen, Akil Abdel Reda, went missing and was later found to have been held for 12 hours by US troops.
The Al-Jazeera offices in Kabul were bombed by US forces during the war against the Taliban regime in Afghanistan in November 2001. Reporters Without Borders asked US defence secretary Donald Rumsfeld at the time for an explanation of the attack but got no answer.
On the 20th day of the war, the media toll is seven journalists and a media assistant killed while covering the conflict. At least five journalists have been wounded and two - Frédéric Nerac and Hussein Osman - both of the British TV network ITN - are still missing.
Those killed were: Paul Moran (ABC, Australia), Terry Lloyd (ITN), Kaveh Golestan (BBC), Michael Kelly (Washington Post), Kamaran Abdurazaq Muhamed (BBC), Christian Liebig (Focus), Julio Anguita Parrado (El Mundo) and Tarek Ayoub (Al-Jazeera).
Reporters Without Borders is keeping count on its website, www.rsf.org, of the number of journalists killed, wounded and missing while doing their job in a war that is very hard for the media to cover.
International secretariat
Middle East desk
5, rue Geoffroy Marie
75009 Paris France
E-mail : middle-east@rsf.org
Web : http://www.rsf.org
Donald Rumsfeld
Paris, 18 April 2003
Dear Sir,
Reporters Sans Frontieres (RSF - Reporters Without Borders), an international organisation which defends press freedom worldwide, protests against the increasingly tough repression against the independent press.
Yours sincerely,
Robert Ménard
General secretary
IRAQ
Reporters Without Borders accuses US military of deliberately firing at journalists
Reporters Without Borders called today on US defense secretary Donald Rumsfeld to provide evidence that the offices of the pan-Arab TV station Al-Jazeera and the Palestine Hotel in Baghdad were not deliberately fired at by US forces earlier in the day in attacks that killed three journalists.
"We are appalled at what happened because it was known that both places contained journalists," said the organisation's secretary-general Robert Ménard. "Film shot by the French TV station France 3 and descriptions by journalists show the neighbourhood was very quiet at that hour and that the US tank crew took their time, waiting for a couple of minutes and adjusting its gun before opening fire."
"This evidence does not match the US version of an attack in self-defence and we can only conclude that the US Army deliberately and without warning targeted journalists. US forces must prove that the incident was not a deliberate attack to dissuade or prevent journalists from continuing to report on what is happening in Baghdad," he said.
"We are concerned at the US army's increasingly hostile attitude towards journalists, especially those non-embedded in its military units. Army officials have also remained deplorably silent and refused to give any details about what happened when a British ITN TV crew was fired on near Basra on 22 March, killing one journalist and leaving two others missing.
"Very many non-embedded journalists have complained about being refused entry to Iraq from Kuwait, threatened with withdrawal of accreditation and being held and interrogated for several hours. One group of non-embedded journalists was held in secret for two days and roughed up by US military police," Ménard said.
Ukrainian cameraman Taras Protsyuk (35), normally attached to Reuters office in Warsaw, and José Couso, a Spanish cameraman for the Spanish TV station Telecinco, were killed in today's attack on the Palestine Hotel. Three other journalists were wounded when their rooms were hit by a shell fired by the US tank.
Gen. Buford Blount, commander of the US Third Infantry Division, admitted that the tank had fired a shell at the hotel. He claimed it was in response to rocket fire and other shooting from the hotel.
Al-Jazeera cameraman Tarek Ayoub was also killed today in US bombing of the pan-Arab TV station's offices elsewhere in the city.
Reporters Without Borders is keeping count on its website, http://www.rsf.org , of the number of journalists killed, wounded and missing while doing their job in a war that is very hard for the media to cover.
--
Christine Poumarède
Presse et parrainages
Email : presse@rsf.org
Tél. : 01 44 83 84 72
Secrétariat international
5, rue Geoffroy-Marie
75 009 Paris
France
Fax : 01 45 23 11 51
http://www.rsf.org/
Photo of casualty from Baghdad’s Palestine Hotel courtesy of Information Clearing House:
http://www.informationclearinghouse.info
Please also read:
US tank shells Baghdad press hotel
Two cameramen from Reuters, Spain's Telecinco die after US tank fired shell at Baghdad's Palestine hotel.
http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article2786.htm
Journalists beaten, starved by US forces: Report;
http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/cms.dll/html/uncomp/articleshow?msid=42280515
Broadcast on April 1, 2003 by Democracy Now!
U.S. Military Detains, Beats and Threatens to Kill Four Foreign Journalists in Iraq
A Democracy Now! interview with Israeli reporter Dan Scemama
Note: This is a Rush Transcript.
http://www.commondreams.org/headlines03/0401-13.htm
No casualties among Japanese in Baghdad hotel
http://www.japantoday.com/e/?content=news&cat=1&id=255999
Please continue for ACTION ALERT:
Media Should Follow Up on Civilian Deaths:
Journalist's evidence that U.S. bombed market ignored by U.S. press...
Reporters Without Borders outraged at bombing of Al-Jazeera office in Baghdad
Reporters Without Borders expressed outrage at today's US bombing of the Baghdad office of the pan-Arab TV station Al-Jazeera that killed one of its journalists, cameraman Tarek Ayoub, and wounded another. The nearby premises of Abu Dhabi TV were also damaged.
"We strongly condemn this attack on an neighbourhood known to include the offices of several TV stations," said secretary-general Robert Ménard in a letter to Gen. Tommy Franks, commander of US military operations in Iraq.
"To ensure the safety of its journalists, Al-Jazeera's management has been careful to inform the Americans of the exact location of its crews right from the start of the war. The US army cannot therefore claim it did not know where the Baghdad offices were.
"Did it at least warn the journalists about an imminent bombing? The outcome was predictable: yet another journalist was killed covering this very deadly war for the media," Ménard said.
He called on Franks to make a serious and thorough investigation of who was responsible for the attack and why it was carried out.
An Al-Jazeera journalist who was in Baghdad until a few days ago told Reporters Without Borders that "it couldn't've been a mistake. We've told the Pentagon where all our offices are in Iraq and hung giant banners outside them saying 'TV.'"
Ayoub, a Jordanian who was the station's permanent correspondent in Amman, was sent to beef up the team in Iraq when the war broke out. He was seriously wounded in today's attack and died soon afterwards.
The Al-Jazeera offices are in an apartment block between the Mansour Hotel and the ministry of planning, in a central Baghdad area of government offices. Another of the station's journalists, Zohair al-Iraqi, an Iraqi, received a neck wound in the attack.
One of Al-Jazeera's vehicles, which was clearly marked, came under fire from US forces on a motorway near Baghdad on 7 April. The station said its office in Basra was directly shelled on 2 April.
Four members of the Al-Jazeera crew in Basra, the only journalists inside the city, came under gunfire from British tanks on 29 March as they were filming distribution of food by Iraqi government officials. One of the station's cameramen, Akil Abdel Reda, went missing and was later found to have been held for 12 hours by US troops.
The Al-Jazeera offices in Kabul were bombed by US forces during the war against the Taliban regime in Afghanistan in November 2001. Reporters Without Borders asked US defence secretary Donald Rumsfeld at the time for an explanation of the attack but got no answer.
On the 20th day of the war, the media toll is seven journalists and a media assistant killed while covering the conflict. At least five journalists have been wounded and two - Frédéric Nerac and Hussein Osman - both of the British TV network ITN - are still missing.
Those killed were: Paul Moran (ABC, Australia), Terry Lloyd (ITN), Kaveh Golestan (BBC), Michael Kelly (Washington Post), Kamaran Abdurazaq Muhamed (BBC), Christian Liebig (Focus), Julio Anguita Parrado (El Mundo) and Tarek Ayoub (Al-Jazeera).
Reporters Without Borders is keeping count on its website, www.rsf.org, of the number of journalists killed, wounded and missing while doing their job in a war that is very hard for the media to cover.
International secretariat
Middle East desk
5, rue Geoffroy Marie
75009 Paris France
E-mail : middle-east@rsf.org
Web : http://www.rsf.org
Donald Rumsfeld
Paris, 18 April 2003
Dear Sir,
Reporters Sans Frontieres (RSF - Reporters Without Borders), an international organisation which defends press freedom worldwide, protests against the increasingly tough repression against the independent press.
Yours sincerely,
Robert Ménard
General secretary
IRAQ
Reporters Without Borders accuses US military of deliberately firing at journalists
Reporters Without Borders called today on US defense secretary Donald Rumsfeld to provide evidence that the offices of the pan-Arab TV station Al-Jazeera and the Palestine Hotel in Baghdad were not deliberately fired at by US forces earlier in the day in attacks that killed three journalists.
"We are appalled at what happened because it was known that both places contained journalists," said the organisation's secretary-general Robert Ménard. "Film shot by the French TV station France 3 and descriptions by journalists show the neighbourhood was very quiet at that hour and that the US tank crew took their time, waiting for a couple of minutes and adjusting its gun before opening fire."
"This evidence does not match the US version of an attack in self-defence and we can only conclude that the US Army deliberately and without warning targeted journalists. US forces must prove that the incident was not a deliberate attack to dissuade or prevent journalists from continuing to report on what is happening in Baghdad," he said.
"We are concerned at the US army's increasingly hostile attitude towards journalists, especially those non-embedded in its military units. Army officials have also remained deplorably silent and refused to give any details about what happened when a British ITN TV crew was fired on near Basra on 22 March, killing one journalist and leaving two others missing.
"Very many non-embedded journalists have complained about being refused entry to Iraq from Kuwait, threatened with withdrawal of accreditation and being held and interrogated for several hours. One group of non-embedded journalists was held in secret for two days and roughed up by US military police," Ménard said.
Ukrainian cameraman Taras Protsyuk (35), normally attached to Reuters office in Warsaw, and José Couso, a Spanish cameraman for the Spanish TV station Telecinco, were killed in today's attack on the Palestine Hotel. Three other journalists were wounded when their rooms were hit by a shell fired by the US tank.
Gen. Buford Blount, commander of the US Third Infantry Division, admitted that the tank had fired a shell at the hotel. He claimed it was in response to rocket fire and other shooting from the hotel.
Al-Jazeera cameraman Tarek Ayoub was also killed today in US bombing of the pan-Arab TV station's offices elsewhere in the city.
Reporters Without Borders is keeping count on its website, http://www.rsf.org , of the number of journalists killed, wounded and missing while doing their job in a war that is very hard for the media to cover.
--
Christine Poumarède
Presse et parrainages
Email : presse@rsf.org
Tél. : 01 44 83 84 72
Secrétariat international
5, rue Geoffroy-Marie
75 009 Paris
France
Fax : 01 45 23 11 51
http://www.rsf.org/
Photo of casualty from Baghdad’s Palestine Hotel courtesy of Information Clearing House:
http://www.informationclearinghouse.info
Please also read:
US tank shells Baghdad press hotel
Two cameramen from Reuters, Spain's Telecinco die after US tank fired shell at Baghdad's Palestine hotel.
http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article2786.htm
Journalists beaten, starved by US forces: Report;
http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/cms.dll/html/uncomp/articleshow?msid=42280515
Broadcast on April 1, 2003 by Democracy Now!
U.S. Military Detains, Beats and Threatens to Kill Four Foreign Journalists in Iraq
A Democracy Now! interview with Israeli reporter Dan Scemama
Note: This is a Rush Transcript.
http://www.commondreams.org/headlines03/0401-13.htm
No casualties among Japanese in Baghdad hotel
http://www.japantoday.com/e/?content=news&cat=1&id=255999
Please continue for ACTION ALERT:
Media Should Follow Up on Civilian Deaths:
Journalist's evidence that U.S. bombed market ignored by U.S. press...