A Peabody Award-winning American journalist was killed in Ukraine Sunday, just outside Kyiv, according to local authorities.
Brent Renaud, 50, was fatally shot in Irpin and two other journalists were wounded when Russian troops opened fire, Kyiv Chief of Police Andrey Nebitov wrote on Facebook.
“The invaders cynically kill even international media journalists who are trying to show the truth about the atrocities of Russian troops in Ukraine,” Nebitov wrote.
“Of course, the profession of a journalist is a risk, but US citizen Brent Renaud paid his life for trying to highlight the aggressor’s ingenuity, cruelty and ruthlessness.”
Renaud and his brother Craig made a name for themselves with their documentary films that have covered “the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, the earthquake in Haiti, political turmoil in Egypt and Libya, the fight for Mosul, extremism in Africa, cartel violence in Mexico, and the youth refugee crisis in Central America,” according to their website.
Their Vice documentary “Last Chance High,” about a school in Chicago that serves students with severe emotional disorders, won a Peabody Award in 2014.
Renaud also previously served as a correspondent for The New York Times, but was not working for the newspaper at the time of his death.
“We are deeply saddened to hear of Brent Renaud’s death,” a spokesperson for The Times said in a statement. “Brent was a talented filmmaker who had contributed to The New York Times over the years.”
White House national security adviser Jake Sullivan called Renaud’s death “shocking and horrifying” and promised “appropriate consequences” for Russia.
“I will just say that this is part and parcel of what has been a brazen aggression on the part of the Russians where they have targeted civilians, they have targeted hospitals, they have targeted places of worship and they have targeted journalists,” Sullivan said on “Face the Nation” Sunday.
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