12 Aug 2008
Two journalists killed, at least three wounded in Georgian conflict
Le Monde reported that so far at least five journalists have been hit since the beginning of hostilities. Two Russian journalists, an American and others were reportedly wounded in one incident, while two Turkish television correspondents were wounded elsewhere.
The two Russian journalists, working for the Russian edition of Newsweek, were apparently killed while approaching Tskhinvali from the Georgian side. Their bodies were reportedly found in a street.
The two Turkish journalists were apparently fired upon in their vehicle while entering the city. They are reportedly in stable condition.
According to Russian newspaper Kommersant, the wounded American is named Winston Featherly. He was seriously injured while in Tskhinvali with a group of Russian journalists. Apparently, Alexander Klimuk, one of the Russian Newsweek journalists, had grown up in Tblissi, and accordingly greeted a group of armed men in Georgian when seeing them from afar in the night. The men were in fact Ossetian militiamen, who in turn fired on the group of journalists thinking they were Georgian military.
Klimuk and his colleague Grigol Chikhladze died soon after, eight other were wounded with Featherly in “serious condition.”