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Al-Jazeera reporter killed in Baghdad by CNN 
Al-Jazeera reporter killed Tuesday, April 8, 2003 Posted: 5:00 AM EDT (0900 GMT) BAGHDAD, Iraq (CNN) -- Al-Jazeera TV says one of its journalists was killed Tuesday when a U.S. airstrike hit a building housing Arab media, the Arab network said. The reporter, identified as Tariq Ayoub, was carried along the street in a blanket before being placed in the back of an Abu Dhabi TV vehicle and being rushed off for medical treatment. An Al-Jazeera reporter on-air said he felt, as did his colleagues, the U.S. strike was a deliberate attack against the network, since two missiles hit the building, not one, and that the raid happened at about the same time Abu Dhabi TV offices were hit. The reporter said he felt this was an attempt to shoot and silence the people who are witnessing crimes against the Iraqi people. However, Pentagon officials adamantly maintain U.S. military forces "absolutely did not" target Al-Jazeera. Baghdad hit CNN Correspondent Lisa Rose Weaver, watching the city from the newly christened Baghdad International Airport, said it was "very obvious ... that a major campaign is being carried out over the capital city." She said bombs from A-10 Warthog jets were being dropped at 5- to 8-second intervals. The warplanes dipped in and out of the low cloud cover, dropping flares and conducting aerobatic moves to confuse heat-seeking missiles on the ground. Correspondent Ron Martz of the Atlanta Journal-Constitution, embedded with Task Force 164 of the 3rd Infantry Division, said the A-10s dropped bombs and strafed Iraqi positions with their 30mm cannons within a mile of his location near central Baghdad. Martz said airstrikes also may have been targeting government buildings and anti-aircraft artillery positions in northern Baghdad. |