Americans order two journalists arrested

US soldiers freed two journalists arrested by Iraqi police a few hours earlier on 19 October while covering the aftermath of an attack on a US convoy in in Fallujah. The police told the journalists - Agence France-Presse (AFP) photographer Patrick Baz and a Reuters cameraman - that they were being detained on US orders and could not be freed until US officers arrived on the scene. They were taken from the Iraqi police station in the town to local US military headquarters and then released. Americans order two journalists arrested Reporters Without Borders protested today at the arrest of Agence France-Presse (AFP) photographer Patrick Baz and a Reuters cameraman while they were covering the aftermath of a 19 October attack on a US army ammunition convoy in Fallujah (50 km west of Baghdad). Iraqi police said they had been ordered by US officials to detain the pair. "Obstruction of journalists trying to do their job in Iraq is on the rise and must stop," said secretary-general Robert Ménard. "The number of attacks on press freedom there are becoming alarming." The two journalists had gone to Fallujah police station after being told the police chief was giving a press conference, but when they got there they were arrested. Baz said in a phone call from the station that the Iraqis, who refused to give their names, were waiting for US officers to turn up and that the Americans were looking for the person who had filmed the attack. Reporters Without Borders said on 25 September that it was deeply concerned about the threatening and repressive attitude of the country's Governing Council, which two days earlier had issued guidelines for the behaviour of the media.