Press TV reporter killed, bureau chief wounded in Syria

TEHRAN - Agence France-Presse

A TV grab posted on the Facebook social network page of Maya Naser shows the Iran's Press TV correspondent reporting from an unknown location. Nasser was killed on Sept 26. AFP photo

Snipers in Damascus killed the correspondent for Iran's Press TV and wounded the network's bureau chief today as they reported from the site of twin bomb blasts near Syrian army headquarters, the channel said.
 
"Press TV correspondent Maya Nasser has been killed by sniper fire in the Syrian capital, Damascus," Press TV said in a bulletin on its news website.
 
Hussein Mortada, a Lebanese national who headed the bureau in Damascus for both Press TV and another Iranian network, Al-Alam, was shot in the back by sniper fire and wounded, both channels said.
 
Nasser and Mortada were targeted when they arrived at the site of the twin bombings near the headquarters of the Syrian armed forces general staff in the capital's heavily guarded Umayyad Square district.
 
Press TV was not immediately able to give Nasser's nationality.
 
Press TV, which broadcasts in English, and Al-Alam, an Arabic-language network, are financed by the Iranian government, which is fully supporting the regime of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad in its struggle against an 18-month rebellion.