Irish cameraman shot dead, UK newsman hurt in Saudi

RIYADH – Gunmen fired at a two-man BBC crew as they filmed in an Islamist militant area of the Saudi capital Riyadh yesterday, killing the Irish cameraman and severely wounding the British journalist.

The British state broadcaster named the cameraman as Simon Cumbers, 36, and the journalist as its security correspondent, 42-year-old Frank Gardner, and said Gardner was being treated in hospital in Riyadh. Gardner was undergoing surgery at the King Faisal Takhassussi Hospital in Riyadh, sources at the hospital said without giving further details.It was the fourth deadly attack on Westerners in the kingdom, the world’s biggest oil exporter, in five weeks.A Western diplomat said the two men were in a car with a Saudi driver in the Suweidi district, filming the house of an al Qaeda militant killed last year in a security crackdown, when they came under fire.Saudi television pictures from the scene showed a Western man, alive but bloodied, lying in the middle of the road before being helped into a vehicle by Saudi security men.- Nampa-ReutersGardner was undergoing surgery at the King Faisal Takhassussi Hospital in Riyadh, sources at the hospital said without giving further details.It was the fourth deadly attack on Westerners in the kingdom, the world’s biggest oil exporter, in five weeks.A Western diplomat said the two men were in a car with a Saudi driver in the Suweidi district, filming the house of an al Qaeda militant killed last year in a security crackdown, when they came under fire.Saudi television pictures from the scene showed a Western man, alive but bloodied, lying in the middle of the road before being helped into a vehicle by Saudi security men.- Nampa-Reuters