US troops admit shooting journalist dead

THE US army yesterday admitted shooting dead an award-winning journalist in Iraq after soldiers mistook his camera for a rocket-propelled grenade launcher.

Mazen Dana, a 41-year-old Palestinian who worked for the Reuters news agency, was filming outside Baghdad’s Abu Ghraib prison on Sunday when was gunned down. He was the 17th journalist to be killed during the war in Iraq. The tape in his camera showed two US tanks approaching him before shots rang out and Mr Dana fell to the ground. His body was taken away by a US helicopter.

“One of the soldiers told us they thought Mazen carrying a rocket propelled grenade,” said Mr Dana’s driver Munzer Abbas. “There were many journalists around. They knew we were journalists. This was not an accident,” he said.