Peabody-winning American filmmaker Brent Renaud was shot and killed by Russian soldiers while covering the 2022 Russian invasion of Ukraine. Two other journalists were injured and taken to hospital.
From a hospital bed as he was being prepped for emergency surgery, Juan Arredondo described his eye-witness account of the attack and said that the group of journalists was filming civilians evacuating through one of the bridges in Irpin when the Russian soldiers targeted them and shot Renaud in his neck.
It was the first reported death of a foreign journalist in the 2022 war in Ukraine.
Renaud was killed in Irpin, a city located on the Irpin River next to the capital city of Kyiv, which is being surrounded by Russian forces.
With his brother Craig, Brent Renaud produced a series of films and television programs featuring stories from the world’s hot spots, among them the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, the 2010 earthquake in Haiti, political crises in Egypt and Libya, conflicts in Africa, Mexican drug war, and the refugee crisis in Central America.
The Renaud brothers appear in the image above, which was posted on their website.
The siblings are the co-founders of the Arkansas Motion Picture Institute, and serve as the executive and artistic directors, respectively, of the Little Rock Film Festival.
The Emmy and DGA Award nominees have also been honored by the International Documentary Association, received an Edward R. Murrow Award, two Columbia Duponts and two Overseas Press Club Awards.
At least 596 people, including 43 children, have been killed since Russia began its invasion on Ukraine, the United Nations said. An additional 1,067 civilians, including 57 children, were wounded as of midnight on Saturday.
U.N. officials have said they believe actual casualties are “considerably higher,” as reports in some areas are delayed and others are pending confirmation.
Most of the casualties have been caused by the use of explosive weapons that have a “wide impact area,” including shelling from heavy artillery and multi-launch rocket systems, missiles and airstrikes, the agency said.
The death toll has continued to rapidly mount since troops invaded on Feb. 24, while Ukrainians still are trying to flee the country.
U.S. officials have said they are collecting evidence of possible war crimes, human rights abuses and violations of international law by Russia.
“What we’ve been seeing in recent three weeks is a series of deliberately committed war crimes, crimes against humanity,” said Ukrainian Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba. “And when they bomb hospitals, maternity houses, schools, when they kill civilians passing by trying to be evacuated from the war zone, that, of course, indicates that they are trying to break us down and to destroy us.”
You must log in to post a comment.