Report: US soldiers 'unlawfully' shot Reuters cameraman
Independent private investigation comes week after 'firing' of Marine officers involved in civilian shooting at Haditha.
US soldiers breached their own rules of engagement when they shot two members of an Iraqi camera crew working for
Reuters last year, an independent private investigation has determined.
Editor & Publisher reports that the investigation, which was commissioned by Reuters, also said that the shooting was "
prima facie unlawful."
Soundman Waleed Khaled was killed and cameraman Haider Kadhem was wounded on Aug. 28, 2005, as they covered the aftermath of an insurgent attack on Iraqi police in western Baghdad.
The investigation by the British risk management consultancy, The Risk Amanagement Group (TRAG), was led by a
former special investigator in Britain's Royal Military Police, who retired after 23 years of service, most recently in Iraq. The report said that the use of force was neither "proportionate nor justified." An earlier invevstigation by the Army had cleared the soldiers involved, but the TRAG report said "the Army inquiry conclusions were not supported by the evidence – including the testimony of the soldiers themselves – and expressed incomprehension that crucial footage shot by Kadhem had somehow been lost by the military."
"We conclude, based on the independent evidence and the evidence of Haider Kadhem, that no hostile act took place and no act could have been legitimately mistaken as indicating hostile intent," said the report. "The engagement was therefore in breach of US rules of engagement and, in our opinion, on the current evidence was prima facie unlawful."
One key piece of evidence – video footage filmed by Mr. Kadhem immediately before and during the shooting – was seized by the US military after the incident. The military showed the footage to several Reuters staffers but then said it had been separated from the case file and subsequently lost.
The New York-based
Committee to Protect Journalists says that of
the 67 journalists killed in Iraq since the invasion of 2003, 14 have been killed by US troops. (Although the CPJ says it has found no evidence to conclude these journalists were targeted by US forces, it continues to investigate the shootings.) Four Reuters journalists have been killed, at least three by US troops. Reuters is currently awaiting an investigation into the death of the fourth.
The
Guardian reports that
a copy of the TRAG report has been given to the Pentagon to review.
Editor & Publisher writes that Reuters has also
asked the US military to open an independent inquiry into the shooting death of Khaled.
"The report shows that Waleed Khaled's death was avoidable and his killing was not justified," said the Reuters global managing editor, David Schlesinger. "We call upon the US military to order a full, independent and objective inquiry into this terrible incident."
Schlesinger added: "It is clear that Khaled was a journalist acting as a professional. He was not a threat, he did nothing hostile, and he should not have been shot and killed. A tragedy like this must not be allowed to pass without us truly learning the lessons from it."
In another incident involving the shooting of Iraqi civilians by US marines in the city of Haditha last November, the
Marine Corps Times reported Tuesday that three Marine officers – including an infantry Battalion commander and two of his company commanders – were "
fired April 7 for lack of confidence."
Relieved were Lt. Col. Jeffrey Chessani, who commanded the Camp Pendleton, Calif.-based 3rd Battalion, 1st Marines; India Company commander Capt. James Kimber; and Kilo Company commander Capt. Luke McConnell, said 2nd Lt. Lawton King, a spokesman for 1st Marine Division at Camp Pendleton.
Officials previously have confirmed that Chessani's battalion was under investigation for an alleged Nov. 19 rampage by the battalion's Kilo Company Marines in the Iraqi city of Haditha that left 15 civilians dead, including seven women and three children. The civilian deaths occurred after a roadside bomb killed one of 3/1's Marines during a combat patrol.
A spokesman for 1st Marine Division at Camp Pendleton did not explicitly connect the ongoing investigation of the incident in Haditha to the firings, but did say that "decision was motivated by multiple incidents that occurred throughout the entire deployment."
Originally US troops said the Iraqi civilians had been killed in a crossfire between them and insurgents attackers. But in a
March 19 article,
Time magazine published the results of a 10-week investigation into the incident that contradicted the initial reports. Their investigation showed the Iraqis killed by the American troops, including the women and children, were not shot in a crossfire.
After the Time report, the Navy Criminal Investigative Service (NCIS) began an investigation in February, and the Marines also launched a second investigation into the incident.
Haditha is a particularly violent place. In the weeks before the incident, several US soldiers had been killed by insurgents. The
Guardian reported last August that the town was
controlled by insurgents and was a "mini-Taliban-like state."
The
Associated Press reported Monday that the Marine unit had returned from Iraq the week before the men were relieved of their commands. Retired Lt. Col. Ken Martin, a former Marine Corps judge who works as a military defense attorney in Tampa, Fla., said that it is very serious for a frontline officer to be
relieved of his command during wartime.
Martin said the firefight almost certainly played a role in [the] decision to relieve the officers.
"Just common sense tells me that would be related," Martin said. "The Marine Corps ethos is if you're a commander, you're responsible, whether your Marines do something good or something bad."
Finally, the
Committee to Protect Journalists has called on Pakistani and US forces
to release all information about missing journalist Hayatullah Khan after his brother claimed he was being held by US forces. Khan had been seized by tribesmen in the North Waziristan tribal region bordering Afghanistan in early December 2005. Khan's colleagues believe he was taken prisoner by some Pakistani authorities after he wrote a story that contradicted an official government version of the killing on an Al Qaeda commander. Khan has written that the US had been involved in the shooting.
Also...
•
Iran can now make glowing Mickey Mouse watches (Informed Comment)
•
Lacking biolabs, trailers carried case for war (Washington Post)
•
Tehran has won (Guardian commentary)
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