Georgian TV reporter shot by Russian sniper during live broadcast

August 21, 2008

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This is the dramatic moment a TV reporter was shot by a sniper as she reported live from war-torn Georgia.

Miss Urushadze, who reports for Georgia’s equivalent of the BBC, was talking live to a TV camera about humanitarian aid arriving in Gori yesterday afternoon when the sniper struck.

In the footage, she gasps as the first bullet grazes her left arm, and instinctively jumps sideways as four more whizz past.

In shock, she slumps to the ground as the cameraman rushes to her side.

Tamara Urushadze took a bullet to her left arm in the flashpoint town of Gori as Russian forces continued their illegal occupation.

Bravely, or foolishly, the 32-year-old brunette continued her report after a few moments as other journalists and aid workers dashed for cover.

Siege-town Gori has become a deadly ’sniper’s alley’ with citizens at the mercy of rampaging militiamen - believed to be from the breakaway republic South Ossetia - looting and firing guns, some drunkenly.

On Sunday video footage caught reporters from two Turkish stations ducking and saying their last prayers as they were fired upon by Russian snipers.

One of the journalists was hit in the eye but his injuries are reportedly not thought to be life-threatening.

‘Friends, I got hit on the head,’ the journalist, Levent Ozturk shouts in the video. ‘I am OK now, but in a few minutes … .’

The four journalists begin reciting a Muslim last prayer. Then they wave through the shattered sunroof of their truck and shout ‘Press! Press!’ in English.

All the journalists, from Turkish networks NTV and Kanal Turk, were safely back in Turkey by yesterday.

The Kremlin stands accused of turning a blind eye to renegades bent on ‘ethnic cleansing’ in revenge for Georgia’s ill-conceived invasion of South Ossetia last Friday.

But in turn Moscow blames the Georgians for abandoning their own people.