British journalist killed in Afghanistan

Rupert Hamer, a defence correspondent with the U.K.’s Sunday Mirror was killed in Afghanistan on Saturday while with a U.S. marine patrol, CBC News reports.

A U.S. marine was also killed, but original reports that an Afghan soldier was also killed have since been changed to state that no Afghans were killed or injured in this blast. A photographer working with Hamer, Philip Coburn, and four marines were seriously injured when a makeshift bomb hit the vehicle the group was travelling in.

Hamer, 39,  is the first British journalist killed in the conflict. His death less than two weeks after Canadian journalist Michelle Lang was killed while on assignment in Afghanistan.

The New York Times reports that “in all, 18 journalists have been killed since the American-led invasion of Afghanistan in 2001 – 12 of them foreigners. But until the past two weeks, none of the other foreigners had been killed while accompanying American or British troops, according to data compiled by the Committee to Protect Journalists. In recent months, embedded journalists have frequently reported that their assignments in Afghanistan have been much more dangerous than previously.”