A war correspondent was killed in Afghanistan days after live-tweeting Taliban RPGs hitting his Humvee

2:24 AM
A broken windshield on the Humvee
A still from video footage captured by Danish Siddiqui inside the Humvee.

Twitter/Danish Siddiqui

  • Danish Siddiqui, a Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist for Reuters, was killed in Afghanistan Friday.
  • He had been embedding with Afghan security forces to cover clashes with the Taliban.
  • Days earlier, he had live-tweeted about Taliban RPGs hitting the Humvee he was in.
  • See more stories on Insider's business page.

A war correspondent was killed in Afghanistan days after he live-tweeted about Taliban RPGs hitting his Humvee.

Danish Siddiqui, the Reuters chief photographer and a Pulitzer Prize winner, was killed in clashes in the Spin Boldak district of Kandahar city, near a border crossing with Pakistan, Reuters reported, citing an Afghan commander.

The commander said Afghan special forces were fighting to retake a market area of Spin Boldak when Siddiqui and a senior Afghan officer were killed. The commander told Reuters they were killed in Taliban crossfire.

Siddiqui had been embedding with the Afghan special forces since earlier this week, Reuters reported.

On Tuesday, he live-tweeted a mission with the Afghan special forces as they tried to "extract a wounded policeman trapped by Taliban insurgents on the outskirts of Kandahar city."

He then tweeted as the Humvees, including one he was in, were attacked.

"Rocket propelled grenades (RPG) and other heavy weapon were used by the Taliban against the convoy resulting in the destruction of 3 Humvees. Gunners atop the Humvees swivelled wildly, aiming fire at suspected Taliban fighters who were hard to see," he tweeted.

This video from Siddiqui shows the moment his vehicle was hit:

"The Humvee in which I was travelling with other special forces was also targeted by at least 3 RPG rounds and other weapons. I was lucky to be safe and capture the visual of one of the rockets hitting the armour plate overhead," he wrote. His report was later published by Reuters.

Reuters President Michael Friedenberg and Editor-in-Chief Alessandra Galloni said in a statement: "Danish was an outstanding journalist, a devoted husband and father, and a much-loved colleague," adding that they were "urgently seeking more information."

Farid Mamundzay, Afghanistan's ambassador to India, tweeted that he was "deeply disturbed by the sad news of the killing of a friend."

Other journalists paid tribute to Siddiqui:

Earlier this year Siddiqui also covered the COVID-19 crisis in his native India.

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