After extinguishing the lives of at least 14,000 people in two weeks, Vladimir Putin's invasion of Ukraine has claimed its first American journalist.
Russian forces outside Kyiv shot and killed award-winning American journalist Brent Renaud, 50, earlier today.
According to Great Britain's The Sunday Times, Renaud's fatal encounter with Russian troops occurred in Irpin, Ukraine. Soldiers at a checkpoint opened fire on a vehicle he and other foreign journalists were riding in.
Andriy Nebytov, head of the Kyiv Oblast police, said Renaud died on Sunday. Two other journalists were wounded and taken to hospital, the Kyiv Independent reported.
Kyiv Oblast police posted graphic photos of Renaud's body, U.S. passport and an expired New York Times press badge.
Fox News has more on the Times' reaction:
“We are deeply saddened to hear of Brent Renaud's death. Brent was a talented filmmaker who had contributed to The New York Times over the years,” a New York Times spokesperson said in an emailed statement to Fox News Digital. “Though he had contributed to The Times in the past (most recently in 2015), he was not on assignment for any desk at The Times in Ukraine. Early reports that he worked for Times circulated because he was wearing a Times press badge that had been issued for an assignment many years ago.”
The dramatic news underscores the dangers facing war correspondents in a conflict where fewer and fewer targets seem to be off-limits.
Watch one of Renaud's wounded colleagues recount the fatal encounter:
The Kyiv suburb of Irpin has witnessed some of the fiercest clashes since the invasion began. Russian forces swiftly took the international cargo airport on the city's northern fringes. Although the Russian Army controls parts of the city, it has lost multiple columns of armored vehicles and mechanized troops attempting to encircle Kyiv.
Ukrainian ground forces have helped tens of thousands of Irpin's citizens evacuate to Kyiv. However, destroyed bridges and railroad tracks have hampered their efforts — in addition to Russian shelling directed at evacuation routes.
Besides contributing extensively to The New York Times, Renaud was a Peabody Award-winning documentary filmmaker and producer.
Meanwhile, attacks on Ukrainian cities throughout the country of 40 million continue.
God bless and keep safe all those in the area.
In the late 1930’s we sit on our hands and did nothing when Germany and Japan invaded sovereign nations and look what that got us. Are we going to sit here and let the BS happen again because we have a feckless president? The stakes are much higher now. I think we should tell Russia to get the hell out of the Ukraine and back it up, or must we watch history all over again, it ain’t a pretty picture.
That’s ok -mumbles biden will just add the reporters name on the list with the 13 military personnel that he had a hand in eliminating !!!??