Media rights group Reporters Without Borders (RSF) has said that more
journalists have been killed in Iraq in two years than during the 20 years
of conflict in Vietnam.

Since US forces and their allies launched their campaign in Iraq on March
20, 2003, 66 journalists and their assistants have been killed, RSF said.
The latest casualty was a Reuters Television soundman who was shot dead in
Baghdad today while a cameraman with him was wounded and then detained by US
soldiers.

The death toll in Iraq compares with a total of 63 journalists in Vietnam
over a period of 20 years from 1955 to 1975, the Paris-based organisation
that campaigns to protect journalists said on its Website.

During the fighting in the former Yugoslavia between 1991 and 1995, 49
journalists were killed doing their job, while 57 journalists and 20 media
assistants were killed during a civil war in Algeria from 1993 to 1996.

RSF listed Iraq as the world's most dangerous place for journalists. In
addition to those killed, 22 have been kidnapped. All but one was released.
Italian journalist Enzo Baldoni was executed by his captors.

The media was targeted from the first days of the fighting, when cameraman
Paul Moran, of the Australian TV network ABC, was killed by a car bomb on
March 22, 2003, it added.

Two other journalists have been missing since March 2003 and August 2004.