Deleting Images of War: Reporting the Truth

U.S. Military Defends Deleting Journalists' Footage

The U.S. military is defending its decision to force two freelance journalists working in Afghanistan for the Associated Press to delete photos and video at the scene of a U.S. shooting last week. An Army spokesperson claimed that taking pictures could misrepresent what had happened in the incident. Col. Victor Petrenko said "When untrained people take photographs or video, there is a very real risk that the images or videography will capture visual details that are not as they originally were." The Associated Press disputed the assertions. AP Executive Editor Kathleen Carroll said: "In democratic societies, legitimate journalists are allowed to work without having their equipment seized and their images deleted."

The US military asserted that an American soldier was justified in erasing journalists’ footage of the aftermath of a suicide bombing and shooting in Afghanistan last week, saying publication could have compromised a military investigation and led to false public conclusions. The comments came March 9 in response to an Associated Press protest that a US soldier had forced two freelance journalists working for the US-based news agency to delete photos and video at the scene of violence March 4 in Barikaw, eastern Afghanistan. At least eight Afghans were killed and 34 wounded. ‘Investigative integrity is one circumstance when civil and military authorities will reluctantly exercise the right to control what a journalist is permitted to document,’ Col. Victor Petrenko, chief of staff to the top US commander in eastern Afghanistan, said in a letter March 9. He added that photographs or video taken by ‘untrained people’ might ‘capture visual details that are not as they originally were.’ The Associated Press disputed the assertions.

Afghan witnesses and gunshot victims said U.S. forces fired on civilians in cars and on foot along at least a 10-kilometer (six-mile) stretch of road from Barikaw following the suicide attack against the Marine convoy. The U.S. military said insurgents also fired on American forces during the attack. One Marine was wounded.

I don't think you can ignore the story!! especially we as photographers here on flickr!!!!!!

This is disgraceful. It’s another example of how our government and military are committing crimes in our name and then re-writing the events. This should be a priority for every media organization in the US. Without freedom of the press, there is no democracy.