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Sgrena shooting a 'blunder'
06/03/2005 19:36 - (SA)
Brussels - An Iraqi minister challenged Sunday the allegation that US troops in Iraq fired deliberately on Italian journalist Giuliana Sgrena after she was released following a month-long kidnap ordeal.
"Why would the Americans want to stop a journalist from being freed?" asked Iraqi Human Rights Minister Bakhtiar Amin in an interview with the Belgian public television channel RTBF.
Amin, who spoke at the end of a visit to Belgium, said a military blunder was a more likely explanation for the incident, in which an Italian intelligence officer was killed and Sgrena was injured when US troops opened fire on their car as it approached a checkpoint.
"I don't know who the driver of the car was and if he knew the rules... a thorough inquiry must be carried out," the minister said.
"Errors are made in difficult security situations, in zones where people are targeted by terrorists.
"You must not forget the criminals who created this situation, it is the abductors who are responsible," he added.
Sgrena was wounded when the convoy taking her to safety was fired on by US troops near Baghdad airport on Friday.
On her return to Rome she said she might have been targeted deliberately by the troops because the Americans opposed negotiations with her kidnappers.
Italy's top intelligence officer in Iraq, Nicola Calipari, was killed in the shooting.
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