In April of 2003, Spanish TV cameraman Jose Couso was killed in Baghdad after a US tank fired on the hotel he was staying in. At the time, the Palestine Hotel was being used by foreign journalists in Baghdad. Taras Portsyuk, a Ukrainian cameraman working for Reuters, was also killed in the blast while an additional three members of the Reuters staff were injured.

The US has admitted that the tank fired at the hotel, but has since cleared its crew of blame, saying the soldiers thought they were being shot at. Footage of the incident did not record any fire from the hotel. Still, a US review of the incident ruled that the use of force against the press was justified.

The family of Jose Couso has now decided to press criminal charges against the US soldiers through the Spanish courts. Spain’s Supreme Court has ruled that the Spanish legal system is competent to judge the three US soldiers. Judge Santiago Pedraz issued an international search-and-capture order, and demanded that prosecutors investigate whether it was possible to freeze the soldiers’ US assets in case of future compensation claims. However, as accountability seems to be in short supply these days, US cooperation with the international arrest warrant is very unlikely.

Unfortunately, this is not the only incident of coalition forces killing members of the free press. Some may remember the story of Tareq Ayoub, an Aljazeera reporter in Iraq, who was killed after an American airstrike leveled the station’s Baghdad bureau. His death came just two weeks after former British home secretary David Blunkett suggested that the station be bombed because he didn’t like what they were reporting. US troops are also responsible for the death of British reporter Terry Lloyd, along with his translator and cameraman. Lloyd had been injured and was being transported by a civilian minibus for treatment when a US marine delivered a fatal shot to his head.

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