Nic Robertson says he expect lies out of governments in that part of the world but that he doesn’t expect them out of other journalists.
From Huffington Post:
Fox News’ defense correspondent, Jennifer Griffin, reported on Monday that the British army had been due to fire seven missiles at Gaddafi’s compound. But the attack was held off, she said, because Libya had brought journalists from CNN, Reuters, the AP, the Times of London and other news outlets to the compound for what, in the government’s words, was a press tour. According to Griffin, the actual reason for bringing the journalists to the compound was to “effectively use them as human shields.”
Speaking to Fox News’ John Roberts, Griffin said that Fox News had kept its correspondent in the region, Steve Harrigan, away from the tour because the network was “concerned they could be used as human shields.”
In an interview with Wolf Blitzer later on Monday, CNN’s senior international correspondent, Nic Robertson, who was one of the reporters on the tour, lashed out at Fox News. He called the report “outrageous and absolutely hypocritical,” and said that, when you come to somewhere like Libya, you expect lies and deceit from the dictatorship here. You don’t expect it from the other journalists.”
Robertson’s report certainly differs a great deal from Faux News’ report. Why would they lie?
I caught the interview live and he was scathing. He stated that the Fox correspondent usually stayed at the hotel and did not venture out like the other reporters. He was very pointed in his disdain for their reporting (or lack of reporting).
I think that Fox is dropping the ball. If the characterization of the Fox reporting team is accurate, they should be recalled or fired. It appears to me that, since England confirmed that missile strikes were curtailed, that Fox used THAT as the reason for calling them, apparently, inaccurately, as human shields.
It seems more likely that they were there at just the “wrong time” and that British aircraft had to abort a strike.