Talk:Waleed Khaled

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Falling morale goes hand-in-hand with a lack of discipline.

There was a vivid example of that here earlier this week when an Iraqi working as a TV sound recordist for the Reuters news agency was shot dead by an American soldier.

His only mistake was to have approached an area where there had been a shooting incident.

Waleed Khaled appears to have been fired on without any warning. He leaves behind a wife who is four months pregnant and a seven-year-old daughter.

The Reuters cameraman with him was injured and, although the main witness to what had happened, he was promptly arrested by the Americans.

Before he was taken away, the cameraman was able to tell colleagues what had occurred.

A senior British official admitted there was now a problem with American troops. When an American journalist working for Reuters, managed to get to the scene with a British security adviser, he found the Americans laughing and joking around Waleed's body.

They were also refusing to give the injured cameraman any water.

The security adviser - a former British soldier - said it was apparent to him that the American troops wanted to clear away any evidence before there could be an outside inquiry.

He said what was most worrying was that the unit did not seem to care that they had shot dead an innocent civilian.

The American military authorities say their investigations are continuing.