This Reuters photo is destined to become the symbol of the Burmese government’s brutal crackdown on pro-democracy demonstrators. Kenji Nagai, a video photographer for Japan’s APFN news service, was fatally shot while covering the protests yesterday.
It’s early, and there are no doubt details we don’t know yet. But according to the photo caption in the Boston Globe, Nagai kept shooting even after he’d been injured. The Washington Post reports that Nagai was taken away by soldiers, but it’s not clear whether he was alive or dead at that point.
The Committee to Protect Journalists has a pretty detailed account that also reports Nagai kept doing his job after he’d been shot. The CPJ’s post includes this statement:
The Committee to Protect Journalists strongly condemns the shootings and the heavy government interference and ongoing harassment of journalists who are attempting to cover the unfolding political events in Burma.
The Guardian has posted a remarkable video of Nagai covering the fall of Baghdad in 2003.