Russian Separatists Trick Journalists And Mothers Into The Line Of Fire

Paul Roderick Gregory, Forbes

News services throughout the world carried dramatic video of a mortally wounded Channel One Russian journalist lying on the floor of a minibus as those around him sought in vain to save his life. Among the bus’s occupants were women, said to be mothers of the Ukrainian soldiers in the garrison outside of Donetsk, who had opened fire on the minibus. (For video, see http://rt.com/news/169304-russian-cameraman-last-video/.)

Thanks to the eyewitness account of a Forbes.ru journalist, we learn that the Russian separatists deliberately sent reporters and mothers of soldiers into the line of fire, hoping to gain a propaganda coup from their deaths or injuries. They succeeded. We remember the shocking first impression, not the latter fact that the tragedy was orchestrated for propaganda gain. That Putin and his agents in east Ukraine are prepared to sacrifice their own reporters and women brings home what Ukraine is up against. Putin will fight to the end before he lets Ukraine go.

Moscow angrily condemned the attack on its journalist. (For a summary of Russian complaints, see RT report in English). According to Russia’s Foreign Ministry, the death of the Channel One camera man shows that Ukrainian law enforcement agencies are blocking the truce and are continuing the brutal persecution of Russian journalists in Ukraine. Russia’s Channel One vented that “Ukrainian power continues killing journalists in the southeast – it [Kiev] is not satisfied that it is impossible to hide the actions against its own people. There [in Kiev] they prefer to deal with the rebels without witnesses.”

(More here.)