Fox News cameraman and local producer killed in Ukraine [Video]

WHAT YOU NEED TO KNOW:

• Fox News cameraman Pierre Zakrzewski was killed Monday while newsgathering outside of Kyiv in Ukraine.
• A Ukrainian journalist who was working as a consultant for Fox News was also killed in the attack.
• Fox News’ correspondent Benjamin Hall was injured in the same attack.

Fox News cameraman Pierre Zakrzewski and local producer Oleksandra “Sasha” Kuvshynova were killed Monday when their vehicle “was struck by incoming fire” while newsgathering in Ukraine. Fox News’ correspondent Benjamin Hall was injured in the same attack outside of Kyiv.

London-based Zakrzewski had “covered nearly every international story for Fox News from Iraq to Afghanistan to Syria during his long tenure with us,” Fox News CEO Suzanne Scott said.

“He was profoundly committed to telling the story and his bravery, professionalism and work ethic were renowned among journalists at every media outlet,” Scott added.

Zakrzewski received a Fox News Media Spotlight Award last year. The award is meant to recognize “extraordinary employees who go above and beyond, inside and outside the workplace.”   

Scott described Kuvshynova as “incredibly talented.” The 24-year-old freelance producer had spent weeks helping the network’s crews navigate Kyiv, gathering information and communicating with sources, “operating around the clock to make sure the world knew what was happening in her country.” 

Fox offered no update on the condition of Hall, their correspondent wounded in the same attack, but said he remained hospitalized on Tuesday. 

“Reporting on this war is a vital public service, and it has already claimed the lives of at least two other journalists in just a few weeks,” Gulnoza Said, the Committee to Protect Journalists’ Europe and Central Asia program coordinator, said in a statement. “Ukrainian and Russian authorities must do their utmost to ensure safety of all journalists, and to thoroughly investigate attacks on the press.”

News of the attack on the Fox crew came just a day after another American journalist, Brent Renaud, was shot and killed in Ukraine. The head of Kyiv’s regional police force said Renaud was killed and another journalist was wounded by Russian forces in the town of Irpin, outside the capital of Kyiv, as they were traveling to film refugees.  

Hall recently made headlines for rebuking Greg Gutfield, co-host of the Fox News political talk show “The Five,” after he said on-air that the reporting from Ukraine “is a lot like other stories that we’ve gone through in the digital age in which an image is taken and then played over and over and over again to create some kind of emotional response out of you, because that makes a profit for news companies.” 

“This is not the media trying to drum up some emotional response,” Hall said. “This is absolutely what’s happening. It is an absolute catastrophe. And the people caught in the middle are the ones who are really suffering.” 

Source: CBS News