Three killed, Iraqi TV cameraman maimed in bomb attack

BAGHDAD  ( 2008-04-02 16:09:40 ) : 

Three people were killed and 13 others wounded, including a cameraman with Iraq's independent Al-Diyar satellite television, in a roadside bombing in Baghdad on Wednesday, officials said.
A security official said the bomb exploded in the eastern neighbourhood of Talbiyah and killed three people.
Thirteen people, including Al-Diyar cameraman Maytham Ibrahim, were wounded in the attack, the official said.
Ibrahim survived but lost a leg, news editor Imed al-Abadi of the station told AFP.
Ibrahim is being treated in Imam Ali hospital in Sadr City, the sprawling bastion of the Mahdi Army militia of powerful Shia cleric Moqtada al-Sadr that bore the brunt of violence this week.
The station has asked for him to be transferred to a more sophisticated facility in Baghdad's heavily fortified Green Zone, Abadi said.
The Paris-based media watchdog Reporters Without Borders, meanwhile, has called for the release of Ahmed Mahmud Hassan, a journalist for Al-Sumariya satellite television channel.
It said Hassan was arrested on March 30 in Mahmudiyah, 30 kilometres (20 miles) south of Baghdad, "while covering clashes between Iraqi forces and rebel insurgents."
The journalist is thought to be detained at a military base, Reporters Without Borders said.
"A score of journalists have been arrested across Iraq since the start of 2008," it said. "Arbitrary arrest has become commonplace in Iraq. The Iraqi authorities must stop this growing obstruction to the work of the media."
According to the Iraqi Journalists Freedom Observatory (JFO), which monitors violence against the media, 233 Iraqi and foreign journalists and media workers have been killed in Iraq since the US-led invasion of March 2003.

Bush calls on Nato allies for Afghan troops

 

BUCHAREST  ( 2008-04-02 15:13:42 ) : 

US President George W. Bush urged Nato allies on Wednesday to send more troops to Afghanistan, saying the alliance could not afford to lose its battle against Taliban insurgents and al Qaeda militants.
In a keynote speech before a summit of the 26-nation defence alliance in the Romanian capital, Bucharest, Bush said: "As (French) President (Nicolas) Sarkozy put it in London last week, we cannot afford to lose Afghanistan. Whatever the cost, however difficult, we cannot afford it, we must win. I agree completely.
Noting that France and Romania were due to send more troops, he said: "We ask other nations to step forward with additional forces as well."
Nato allies want the Bucharest summit, starting later on Wednesday, to send the message that its 47,000-strong peacekeeping force will stay in Afghanistan for as long as necessary to battle the insurgency.
"Our alliance must maintain its resolve and finish the fight... If we do not defeat the terrorists in Afghanistan, we will face them on our soil," Bush said.
French Prime Minister Francois Fillon said on Tuesday Paris was looking to send several hundred more troops to Afghanistan.
That was far short of the 1,000 extra soldiers that some Nato allies had been expecting and it was not clear whether it would be enough to cover a Canadian demand for reinforcements in the south.
Ottawa has said it could pull its 2,500 troops out of the fight next year if the reinforcements were not forthcoming.