A cameraman for Iranian English-language news network Press TV has died nearly a week after he was injured when a rocket hit the network’s Kabul office as gunmen attacked buildings near the U.S. embassy and NATO headquarters.
Press TV reported Tuesday that Farhad Taqaddosi died in a hospital in the Afghan capital city earlier that day.
The network said Taqaddosi was working in its office on 13 September when the building came under attack as reported Taliban insurgents launched a barrage of rockets and gunfire on the heart of Kabul’s diplomatic and military enclave.
International Press Institute (IPI) Director Alison Bethel McKenzie said:
“Our sympathies go out to Mr. Taqaddosi’s friends and colleagues. His tragic death shows how Afghanistan continues to be extremely dangerous for those who practice journalism.”
According to IPI’s Death Watch, Taqaddosi was the second journalist killed in Afghanistan this year. BBC World Service and Pajhwok Afghan News agency reporter Ahmad Omed Khpalwak was mistakenly shot by U.S. troops on 28 July. Twenty-four journalists have now died in the country since the beginning of the U.S.-led invasion that followed in the wake of the 11 September 2001 terrorist attacks.