Kyiv Region police say a U.S. video journalist has died and another journalist was injured when they were attacked by Russian forces in Ukraine.
The police force said Sunday on its official website that Russian troops opened fire on the car of Brent Renaud and another journalist in Irpin near the capital. It said the injured journalist was being taken to a hospital in Kyiv.
“Of course, the profession of journalism carries risks. Nonetheless, U.S. citizen Brent Renaud paid with his life trying to highlight the deceit, cruelty and ruthlessness of the aggressor,” the police force said.
A New York Times spokesperson confirmed Renaud’s death, calling him a “talented filmmaker who had contributed to The New York Times over the years.” It said he was not working for the publication at the time of his death.
Brent Renaud, an award-winning American filmmaker and journalist, was killed on Sunday while reporting in Irpin, a Kyiv suburb, Ukrainian authorities said. https://t.co/4ckuHiZoxK
— The New York Times (@nytimes) March 13, 2022
Juan Arredondo told Italian journalist Annalisa Camilli in an interview from the hospital before being taken for surgery that were filming refugees fleeing the area when they were shot at while in a car approaching a checkpoint. The driver turned around but the firing at them continued, Arredondo added.
Camilli told The Associated Press that she was at the hospital when Arredondo arrived and that he had been wounded in the lower back.
Asked about the reports, White House national security adviser Jake Sullivan told CBS News that the U.S. government would be consulting with the Ukrainians to determine how this happened and would then “execute appropriate consequences.”
“This is part and parcel of what has been a brazen aggression on the part of the Russians, where they have targeted civilians, they have targeted hospitals, they have targeted places of worship, and they have targeted journalists,” Sullivan said.