US soldier kills BBC's Afghan journalist

Thu Sep 8, 2011

A BBC reporter has been shot dead by an American soldier in the NATO-led International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) in Afghanistan in July, based on the facts revealed on September 8.

BBC Pashto service journalist Ahmed Omed Khpulwak, 25, took refuge in a bathroom after heavy fighting broke out in Tarin Kowt's market following suicide bombings but was eventually shot dead by an American soldier that allegedly mistook him for a suicide bomber, the state-run BBC reported on Thursday.

Brigadier General Carsten Jacobson said Khpulwak was described by soldiers as “holding a gadget in his hands and reaching for something in his pocket.”

Jacobson said, “The US soldiers got the task to clear the building after they were informed that suicide bombers had forced their way into it. Two of the bombers had detonated themselves and blew parts of the building down.”

“Whilst the soldiers were continuing to conduct the operations to clear it, there was an observation made of a young male identified next to the room the suicide bombers detonated themselves, and he was taken as an enemy.”

He said that the American soldier mistook Khpulwak by his actions because he was holding “a technical gadget” in his hand that was later identified as a telephone.

Jacobson, however, admitted that the “gadget” could certainly have been a press card with which Khpulwak was trying to identify himself as a journalist.

Source: PressTV.
Link: http://www.presstv.com/detail/198139.html.